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DESCRIPTIVE AND HISTORICAL ACCOUNT 

OF 

HYDRAULIC AND OTHER MACHINES 

FOR 

RAISING WATER, 

gtictent an& <Holrern: 
WITH OBSERVATIONS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS 

CONNECTED WITH THE 

MECHANIC ARTS: 

INCLUDING THE PROGRESSIVE DEVELOPMENT OF 

THE STEAM ENGINE: 

DESCRIPTIONS OF EVERY VARIETY OF BELLOWS. PISTON. AND ROTARY PUMPS — FLRE EN- 
GINES — WATER RAMS — PRESSURE ENGINES — ALR MACHINES — EOLIPILES. fcC. REILARKS ON 

ANCIENT WELLS — AIR BEDS COG WHEELS — BLOWPIPES — BELLOWS OF VARIOUS PEOPLE — 

MAGIC GOBLETS — STEAM IDOLS. AND OTHER MACHINERY OF ANCIENT TEMPLES. TO WHICH 
ARE ADDED EXPERIMENTS ON BLOWING AND SPOUTING TUBES. AND OTHER ORIGINAL 
DEVICES — NATURE'S MODES AND MACHINERY FOR RAISING WATER. HISTORICAL NOTICES 
RESPECTING SIPHONS, FOUNTAINS. WATER ORGANS, CLEPSYDRA. PIPES, VALVES, COCKS. &C. 

IN FIVE BOOKS. 

ILLUSTRATED BY NEARLY THREE HUNDRED ENGRAVINGS. 

FOURTH EDITION, 

REVISED AND CORRECTED TO WHICH IS ADDED, A SUPPLEMENT 

BY THOMAS EWBANK. 



It is a cruel mortification in searching for what is instructive in the history of past times, to find the 
exploits of conquerors who have desolated the earth, and the freaks of tyrants who have rendered na- 
tions unhappy, are recorded with minute and often disgusting accuracy— while the discovery of usefui 
arts, and the progress of the most beneficial branches of commerce, are passed over in silence, and suf- 
fered to sink into oblivion. Robertson's India. 



. NEW YORK: 
SOLD BY BANGS, PLATT, 6c CO.. 

204 BROADWAY. 
1S50. 



TS 



Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1842, by Thomas Ewbank, in the Clerk's Offic* 
of the Southern District of New-York. 



M} 



Dill, Stereotyper, 128 Fulton et 



^ 2 £&l 

5 



PREFACE 



Circumstances having led me, in early life, to take an interest ii 
practical hydraulics, I became anxious to obtain an account of all the con • 
trivances employed by different people to raise water — whether for domes- 
tic, agricultural, mining, manufacturing, or other purposes ; and great was 
the disappointment I felt on learning that no book containing the informa- 
tion I sought had ever been published. This was the case between thirty 
and forty years ago ; and, notwithstanding the numerous journals and other 
works devoted to the useful arts, it is in a great measure the case still. No 
one publication, so far as my knowledge extends, has ever been devoted 
to the great variety of devices which the human intellect has developed 
for raising liquids. That such a work is wanted by a large class of 
mechanics, if not by others, can hardly be questioned ; and it is somewhat 
surprising that it was never undertaken. 

It appears from La Hire's Preface to Mariotte's Treatise on the Motion 
of Fluids, that the latter philosopher often expressed a determination to 
write " on the different pumps and other engines which are in use, or which 
have been proposed," but unfortunately he did not live to carry his design 
into effect. The celebrated work of Belidor, from its extent, and the variety 
of subjects embraced and illustrated, stands at the head of modern works 
on hydraulic devices ; but of the four large volumes, a small part only is 
devoted to machines for raising water, and many such are not noticed at 
all : besides, the cost of the work and the language in which it is written 
will always prevent it from becoming a popular one with American or 
English machinists. 

Having in the course of several years collected memoranda and procured 
most of the works quoted in the following pages, I have attempted to pre- 
pare a popular volume on the subject — something like the one I formerly 
longed for — feeling persuaded that it will be as acceptable to mechanics 
under circumstances similar to those to which I have alluded as it would 
then have been to myself. Every individual device for raising water has, 
of course, not been described, for that would have been impossible ; but 
every class or species will be found noticed, with such examples of each 
as will enable the general reader to comprehend the principle and action 
of all. In addition to which, inventors of hydraulic machines can here 
see what has been accomplished, and thus avoid wasting their energies 
on things previously known. 



IV PREFACE. 

In a work of this kind little that is new can be expected ; I have not, 
however, servilely copied any author, but have written the whole as if 
little had been written before. I have sought for information wherever I 
could find it; and with this view have perused more volumes than it would 
be prudent to name. A few gleanings which modern writers have passed 
over have been picked up — two or three ancient devices have been snatched 
from oblivion, as the atmospheric sprinkling pot and the philosophical bel- 
lows, and some erroneous opinions have been corrected ; that, for example, 
respecting the origin of the safety valve. There is little room for the 
charge of arrogance in claiming this much, since it is all I have to claim 
and it is nothing but what a little industry in any one else would have 
realised. Several devices of my own have also been introduced which 
must speak for themselves. On referring to old works that are expensive 
or of rare occurrence I have generally quoted the very words of the writers, 
under the impression that some of these works will not long be met with 
at all. For the convenience of perusal the work is broken into chapters, 
and as much miscellaneous matter has been introduced, an index is added. 
The general arrangement and division of the subject will be found at the 
close of the first chapter. 

In tracing the progress of any one of the primitive arts, it is difficult to 
avoid reference to others. They are all so connected that none can be per- 
fectly isolated. I have therefore introduced such notices of inventions and 
inventors as seemed useful to be known : facts which appeared interesting 
to the writer as a mechanic, he supposed would not be wholly without 
interest in the opinion of his brethren. In this, I am aware, it is easy to 
to be mistaken ; for it is a common error to imagine that things which are 
interesting to ourselves must be equally so to others. As, however, all 
those devices that contribute to the conveniences of life will ever possess 
an intrinsic value, the hope is indulged that the following account of 
several important ones, although it may present little attraction to general 
readers, will at least be found useful to those for whom it is more espe- 
cially designed. It certainly is not what I could wish, but it is the best I 
could produce. I am sensible that it has many imperfections, and there 
are doubtless many more which have not been perceived. That I have 
often been diverted from the subjects embraced in the t j^e-page is true ; 
and as the whole was written at long intervals, even of years, a want 
of order and connection may be perceived in some parts, and obscurity felt 
in others. All that I can offer to diminish the severity of criticism, is freely 
to admit there is much room for it. 

In noticing various hydraulic devices, I have endeavored to award honor 
to whomsoever it was due : to say nothing of the ancients, with whom most 
of them originated, it may here be observed that the Germans were the 
earliest cultivators of practical hydraulics in modern times. The Dutch 
(part of that people) contributed to extend a knowledge of their inven- 
tions. It was a Dutchman who constructed the famous machinery at Marli, 
and England was indebted to another for her first water-works at London 
Bridge. The simplest pump-box or piston known, the inverted cone of 
leather, is of German origin, and so is the tube-pump of Muschenbroek. 
Hose for fire-engines, both of leather and canvas, was invented by Dutch- 
men. They carried the chain-pump of China to their settlements in India, 
and also to Europe. Van Braam brought it to the U. States. A German 
invented the air-pump, and the first high pressure steam-engine figured in 
books was by another. As regards hydraulic machinery, the Dutch have 
been to the moderns, in some degree, what the Egyptians were to the 
ancients — their teachers. The physical geography of Holland and Egypt 



PREFACE. 



necessarily led the inhabitants of both countries to cultivate to the utmost 
extent the art of raising water. Wind-mills for draining water off land 
first occur (in modern days) in Holland. It is indeed the constant employ 
ment of this element — wind — that preserves the Dutch from destruction 
by another ; for, as a nation, they are in much the same predicament they 
formerly put unruly felons in, viz : confining each in a close vault with a 
pump, and then admitting a stream of water that required his unceasing 
efforts to pump out, to prevent himself from drowning. 

The French have contributed the neatest machine known ; the ram of 
Montgolfier — theirs is the double pump of La Hire, and the frictionless 
piston of Gosset — La Faye improved the old tympanum of Asia — Papin 
was one of the authors of the steam-engine, and Le Demour devised the 
centrifugal pump. Rotary pumps and the reintroduction of air-vessels and 
fire-engines rest between Germany and France. Drawn leaden pipes 
were projected by Dalesme. The English revived the plunger pump and 
stuffing-box of Moreland, and furnished the expanding metallic pistons of 
Cartwright and Barton — the steam-engines of Worcester and Savery, New- 
comen and Watt — the pneumatic apparatus of Brown, and motive engines 
of Cecil and others — Whitehurst was the first to apply the principle of 
the ram, and the quicksilver pump was invented by Hawkins — Hales 
invented the milling of sheet lead, and the first drawn pipes were made 
by Wilkinson. Switzerland contributed the spiral pump of Wirtz — Ame- 
rica has furnished the riveted hose of Sellers and Pennock, the motive 
machine of Morey, and high pressure engines of Evans ; and both have 
given numerous modifications of every hydraulic device. The Italians 
have preserved many ancient devices, and to them the discoveries of Gal- 
lileo and Torricelli respecting atmospheric pressure are due. Porta has 
given the first figure of a device for raising water by steam, and Venturi's 
experiments have extended their claims. 

Remarks have occasionally been introduced on the importance of the 
mechanic arts and the real dignity attached to their profession, notwith- 
standing the degraded state in which operatives have ever been held by 
those who have lived on their ingenuity and become enriched by their 
skill. But this state of things we believe is passing away, and the time is 
not distant when such men, instead of being deemed, as under the old 
regime, virtual serfs, will exert an influence in society commensurate with 
their contributions to its welfare. And where, it may be asked, is there 
a comfort, or convenience, or luxury of life, which they do not create or 
assist to furnish, from the bread that sustains the body to the volume that 
informs the mind 1 

Few classes have a more honorable career before them than intelligent 
mechanics. Certainly none have better opportunities of associating their 
names with those of the best of their species. Science and the arts open 
the paths to true glory ; and greater triumphs remain to be achieved in 
both than the world has yet witnessed. Human toil has not been dispensed 
with, but it certainly will be superseded, in a great measure, if not alto- 
gether, by forces derived from inanimate nature. A great part of the globe 
is yet a desert, inhabited by beasts of prey, or by men more savage than 
they ; whereas the Creator designs the whole to be a garden and peopled 
with happy intelligences, as in the first Eden. It is much too common to 
seek ephemeral distinction on the troubled sea of politics or party ; but of 
the thousands who launch their barks upon it, how few ever reach the 
haven of their wishes ! The greater part are soon engulphed in oblivion, 
while not a few, exhausted by useless struggles, are bereft of their ener- 
gies and quickly sink in despair — but no fame is more certain or more 



VI PREFACE. 



durable than that which arises from useful inventions, Whitney and 
Whittemore, Evans and Fulton, will be remembered as long as cotton gins, 
carding machines, steam-engines, and steam-boats are known on these 
continents, and when contemporary politicians are wholly forgotten — in 
fact most of these are so already. The name of Watt will be known while 
that of every warrior and monarch and statesman of his day has perished ; 
and so it ought to be, for with few exceptions, he contributed more to the 
happiness of his species than have such men from the beginning of time. 
No one is now interested in learning any thing respecting the sanguinary 
Bull of Burgundy and his wily antagonist, the eleventh Louis of France, 
whose contests kept for years the European world in an uproar ; and the 
latter, not content with murdering his species by wholesale, in his old age 
slew infants that he might acquire new vigor by bathing in their blood : 
but as long as time endures, the world will revere the names of their 
contemporaries — Gottenburg, Koster, Faust, and SchoefFer and their asso- 
ciates in printing and type-founding. 

Science and the arts are renovating the constitution of society. The 
destiny of nations cannot be much longer held by political gamblers, wealthy 
dolts, titled buffoons, and royal puppets ; these no longer sustained by 
factitious aids must descend to their own level. Theories of governments 
will not be opposed to nature and carried out in violation of her laws ; but 
practical science will be the ruling principle ; and practical philosophers 
will be, as God designed they should be, the master spirits of the world. 
The history and progress of the useful arts will soon become a subject of 
general study. Historians will hereafter trace in them the rise and fall of 
nations ; for power and preeminence will depend upon new discoveries in 
and applications of science. Battles will soon be fought by engineers 
instead of generals, and by mechanism in place of men. But battles, we 
trust, will hereafter be few ; for if ever men were called upon by that 
which is dear to them and their race — by that which is calculated to rouse 
the purest feelings and exterminate the worst ones, it is to denounce that 
spirit of military glory which encourages and induces offensive wars. Take 
away all the false glare and pomp of wars, and tyranny will expire — for it 
would have nothing to support it. Put war in its true light, and no well 
regulated mind would ever embrace it as a profession. 

To poets and writers of romance, the annals of mechanism present un- 
explored sources of materials. They are mines of the richest ores — 
fields teeming with the choicest fruits and flowers. Here are to be found 
incidents as agreeable and exciting in their natures, and as important in 
their effects as anything that can be realized by the imagination alone ; 
such too, as present nothing to offend the finest taste, or conflict with the 
purest morals. When novelists have worn out the common ground ; (and 
they seem already to have done so,) when mere sentiment grows flat, and 
the exhibition of the passions becomes stale ; when politics, history and 
love are exhausted — works founded on the origin, progress, and maturity 
of the useful arts will both charm the imagination and improve the judgment 
of readers. Does an author wish to introduce characters who have left 
permanent impressions of their genius upon the world] Where can he find 
them in such variety as in the race of inventors ? Is he desirous of enrich- 
ing his pages with singular coincidences, curious facts, surprising results 
— to fascinate his readers, and cause them to anticipate the end of his pages 
with regret 1 Let him detail the circumstances that led to the conception, 
and accompanied the improvement of those inventions and discoveries that 
have elevated civilized man above the savage. 

Is such a writer desirous, for instance, to entertain the sex 1 He could 



PREFACE. ,V11 

hardly do it more effectually than by writing a volume on the labors of 
primitive spinsters, ere the distaff was adopted, or the spindle (the original 
fly-wheel) was invented ; by detailing the circumstances that gave birth 
to those implements, with the trials, observations, customs and anecdotes 
connected with their introduction and their uses — imagining the congra- 
tulations that were poured upon the artist who wove the first web in a 
loom, and the praises bestowed upon the author of that machine and the 
shuttle — recalling the times and scenes when groups of laughing females 
were hastening to examine the first colored mantles ; and recording the 
bursts of admiration which dropped from them (in all the force of oriental 
hyperbole) upon witnessing the processes by which purple and scarlet 
and crimson and green, &c. were produced — recounting the methods by 
which the art of dyeing wrought a revolution in costume, and how it be- 
came one of the great sources of wealth to Babylon and Tyre — referring 
to the gratification which the invention of needles and pins, of thimbles 
and combs, conferred on ancient dames ; and noticing the influence of 
these in improving the dress and deportment of women — describing the 
trials of artists before they succeeded in perfecting these instruments, and 
so on, until every addition to domestic dwellings, to household furniture, 
and to dress be reviewed — until every thing which a modern lady possesses 
over an Indian's squaw be brought forward and described, with all the 
known facts and circumstances associated with its history and application ; 
— and thus form a series of essays on the arts, in which every line would 
be poetry, and every incident new. 

A new species of drama might here take its rise ; one possessing equal 
attractions and exhibiting equally interesting pictures of human life, as 
any thing which writers of comedy or tragedy have yet produced. Here 
are characters and customs of every variety, age, and nation — incidents 
and adventure in the greatest profusion — the extremes of misery and bliss, 
of poverty and wealth, of suffering virtue and unrequited toil, and their 
opposites. Here the humblest individuals have, by industry and ingenuity, 
risen from obscurity and astonished the world. Mechanics have become 
kings like the old potter of Sicily, (Agathocles,) Aurelius the blacksmith 
of Rome, and Leitz the tinker who founded the caliph dynasty of the 
Soffarites. Kings have left their thrones to become workmen in brass and 
silver, wood and iron ; as Demetrius at his lathe, jEropus making lamps 
and tables, Charles V. in his watchmaker's shop ; and if some bizarre 
examples are wanted, there is still to be seen the mantua-making apart- 
ment of Ferdinand VII. with specimens of his work. 

A play might be founded on the fairs held at Delos, (the Pittsburg of 
of the old Greeks,) where merchants (observes Pliny) assembled from all 
parts of the world to purchase hardware and bronze. An island whose 
artists were ennobled for the beauty and finish of their works in the metals, 
and who particularly excelled in brazen feet for chairs, tables, and bed- 
steads, and in statues and other large works in brass. Then there was 
the workmen of JEgina, who beat all others in fabricating branches and 
and sockets of candelabra ; while those of Tarentum produced the best 
pedestals or shafts. In connection with which, there is the singular story 
of the Lady Gegania, who, after giving 50,000 sesterces for a bronze candle- 
stick, adopted its ill-favored and hump-backed maker for her companion 
and heir. 

How rich in interest would a dramatic scene be if laid in an antediluvian 
smith's shop ! (Forges have always been places of resort.) To notice 
the characters of the visitants, listen to their remarks, examine the instru- 
ments fabricated by the artist, his materials, fuel, bellows, and other tools 3 



V1U PREFACE. 

There is not a more interesting scene in all the Iliad than the description 
of Vulcan at work. But if such a distance of time is too remote, there is 
the forge of Kawah, the blacksmith of Ispahan, he whose apron was for 
centuries the banner of the Persian empire. The forge of Aurelius also, 
where he made the sword by which he was while emperor slain. 

A scene might open in the barber's shop of Alexandria, in which the boy 
Ctesibius used to play, and where the first scintillations of his genius 
broke out ; while his subsequent speculations, his private essays and public 
experiments, some of which were probably exhibited before the reigning 
Ptolemies, might be brought into view — his pupil, Heron, and other 
philosophers and literati might also be included in the plot. Of the con- 
nection of barbers with important events there is no end — there was the 
tatling artist of Midas, the spruce hair-dresser of Julian the emperor, the 
inquisitive one that saved CaBsar's life by listening to the conversation of 
assassins — the history of the silver shaving vessel with which the benevo- 
lent father of Marc Anthony relieved the pecuniary distresses of a friend 
— there was the wicked Oliver Dain ; and the ancestor of Tunstall, the 
famous Bishop of Durham, was barber to William the Conqueror : hence 
the bishop's coat of arms contained three combs. 

Who would not go to see a representation of the impostures of the 
heathen priesthood % Men who in the darkest times applied some of the 
finest principles of science to the purposes of delusion ! With what 
emotions should we enter their secret recesses in the temples ! — places 
where their chemical processes were matured, their automaton figures and 
other mechanical apparatus conceived and fabricated, and where experi- 
ments were made before the miracles were consummated in public. But 
it is impossible to enumerate a tithe of the subjects and incidents for the 
drama that might be derived from the history of the arts : they are more 
numerous than the mechanical professions — more diversified than articles 
of traffic or implements of trades. The plots, too, might be rendered as 
complicated, and their denouement as agreeable or disagreeable as could 
be desired : and what is better than all, in such plays the moral, intel- 
lectual and inventive faculties of an audience would be excited and im- 
proved — science would pervade every piece, and her professors would 
be the principal performers. 

THOS. EWBANK. 

Mio-York, December, 1841. 



CONTENTS. 

BOOK I. 

PRIMITIVE AND ANCIENT DEVICES FOR RAISING WATER- 
CHAPTER I. 

The subject of raising water interesting to philosophers and mechanics — Led to the invention of ths 
steam engine — Connected with the present advanced state of the arts — Origin of the useful arts 
lost — Their history neglected by the ancients — First inventors the greatest benefactors — Memorials 
of them perished, while accounts of warriors and their acts pervade and pollute the pages of his- 
tory — A record of the origin and early progress of the arts more useful and interesting than all 
the works of historians extant— The history of a single tool (as that of a hammer) invaluable — In 
the general wreck of the arts of the ancients, most of their devices for raising water preserved — 
Cause of this — Hydraulic machines of very remote origin — Few invented by the Greeks and Ro- 
mans — Arrangement and division of the subject - • 1 

CHAPTER II. 

Water — Its importance in the economy of nature — Forms part of all substances — Food of all animals 
— Great physical changes effected by it — Earliest source of inanimate motive power — Its distnbu 
tion over the earth not uniform — Sufferings of the orientals from want of water — A knowledge of 
this necessary to understand their writers — Political ingenuity of Mahomet — Water a prominent 
feature in the paradise of the Asiatics — Camels often slain by travelers, to obtain water from their 
stomachs — Cost of a draught of such water — Hydraulic machine referred to in Ecclesiastes — The 
useful arts originated in Asia — Frimitive modes of procuring water — Using the hand as a cup — 
Traditions respecting Adam — Scythian tradition — Palladium — Observations on the primitive state 
of man, and the origin of the arts ..-------9 

CHAPTER III. 

Origin of vessels for containing water — The calabash the first one — It has always been used — Found 
by Columbus in the cabins of Americans — Inhabitants of New Zealand, Java, Sumatra, and of the 
Pacific Islands employ it — Principal vessel of the Africans — Curious remark of Pliny respecting it 
— Common among the ancient Mexicans, Romans and Egyptians — Offered by the latter people on 
their altars— The model after which vessels of capacity were originally formed — Its figure still 
preserved in several — Ancient American vessels copied from it — Peruvian bottles — Gurgulets — 
The form of the calabash prevailed in the vases and goblets of the ancients — Extract from Persius' 
satires — Ancient vessels for heating water modeled after it — Pipkin — Saucepan — Anecdote of t, 
Roman dictator — The common cast-iron cauldron of great antiquity: similar in shape to those 
used in Egypt in the time of Rameses — Often referred to in the Bible and in the Iliad — Greeian, 
Roman, Celtic, Chinese and Peruvian cauldrons — Expertness of Chinese tinkers — Crcesus and the 
Delphic oracle — Uniformity in the figure of cauldrons — Cause of this — Superiority of their form 
over straight-sided boilers — Brazen cauldrons highly prized — Water pots of the Hindoos — Women 
drawing water — Anecdote of Darius and a young female of Sardis — Dexterity of oriental women 
in balancing water pots — Origin of the canopus — Ingenuity and fraud of an Egyptian priest — 
Ecclesiastical deceptions in the middle ages - - - - - - - -14 

CHAPTER IT. 

On wells — Water one of the first objects of ancient husbandmen — Lot — Wells before the deluge- 
Digging them through rock subsequent to the use of metals — Art of digging them carried to great 
perfection by the Asiatics — Modern methods of making them in loose soils derived from the East — 
Wells often the nuelei of cities — Private wells common of old — Public wells infested by banditti — 
Wells numerous in Greece — Introduced there by Danaus — Facts connected with them in the 
mythologic ages — Persian ambassadors to Athens and Lacedemon thrown into wells — Phenician, 
Carthagenian and Roman wells extant — Caesar and Pompey's knowledge of making wells enabled 
them to conquer — City of Pompeii discovered by digging a well — Wells in China, Persia, Palestine, 
India and Turkey — Cisterns of Solomon — Sufferings of travelers from thirst — Affecting account 
from Leo Africanus — Mr. Bruce in Abyssinia — Dr. Ryers in Gombroon — Hindoos praying for 
water— Caravan of 2000 persons and 1800 camels perished in the African desert — Crusaders - 24 

CHAPTER V 

Subject of Wells continued— Wells worshiped— River Ganges— Sacred well at Benares — Oatbs taken 
at wells— Tradition of the rabbins — Altars erected near them— Invoked— Ceremonies with regard 
t» water in Egypt, Greece, Peru, Mexico, Rome, and Judea— Temples erected over wells— The: 



X CONTENTS. 

fountain of Apollo — Well Zem Zem — Prophet Joel — Temple of Isis — Mahommedan mosques — 
Hindoo temples — Woden's well — Wells in Chinese temples — Pliny — Celts — Gauls — Modern super- 
stitions with regard to water and wells — Hindoos — Algerines — Nineveh — Greeks — Tombs of saints 
near wells — Superstitions of the Persians — Anglo-Saxons — Hindoos — Scotch — English — St. Gene- 
vieve's well — St. Winifred's well — House and well 'warming' - - - - - 33 

CHAPTER VI. 

Wells continued — Depth of ancient wells — In Hindostan — Well of Tyre — Carthagenian wells — Wells 
in Greece, Herculaneum and Pompeii — Wells without curbs — Ancient laws to prevent accidents 
from persons and animals fallinginto them — Sagacity and revenge of an elephant — Hylas — Arche- 
laus of Macedon — Thracian soldier and a lady at Thebes — Wooden covers — Wells in Judea — 
Reasons for not placing curbs round wells — Scythians — Arabs — Aquilius — Abraham — Hezekiah — 
David — Mardonius — Moses and the people of Edom — Burckhardt in Petra — Woman of Bahurim — 
Persian tradition — Ali the fourth caliph — Covering wells with large stones — Mahommedan tradi- 
tion — Themistocles — Edicts of Greek emperors — Well at Heliopolis — Juvenal — Roman and Gre- 
cian curbs of marble — Capitals of ancient columns converted into curbs for wells - - 37 

CHAPTER VII. 

Wells concluded — Description of Jacob's well — Of Zemzem in Mecca — Of Joseph's well at Cairo — 
Reflections on wells — Oldest monuments extant — Wells at Elim — Bethlehem — Cos — Scyros — Heli 
opolis — Persepolis — Jerusalem — Troy — Ephesus — Tadmor — Mizra — Sarcophagi employed as wa- 
tering troughs — Stone coffin of Richard III used as one — Ancient American wells — Indicate the 
existence in past times of a more refined people than the present red men — Their examination 
desirable — Might furnish (like the wells at Athens) important data of former ages - - - 44 

CHAPTER VIII. 
Ancient methods of raising water from wells : Inclined planes — Stairs within wells : in Mesopotamia 
— Abyssinia — Hindostan — Persia — Judea — Greece — Thrace — England. Cord and bucket: used at 
Jacob's well — By the patriarchs — Mahomet — In Palestine — India — Alexandria — Arabian vizier 
drawing water — Gaza — Herculaneum and Pompeii — Wells within the houses of the latter city — 
Aleppo — Tyre — Carthage — Cleanthes the 'well drawer' of Athens, and successor of Zeno — Demo- 
critus — Plautus — Asclepiades and Menedemus — Cistern pole — Roman cisterns and cement — An- 
cient modes of purifying water - - - - - - - - - -El 

CHAPTER IX. 

The pulley its origin unknown — Used in the erection of ancient buildings and in ships — Ancient 
one found in Egypt — Frobably first used to raise water — Not extensively used in ancient Grecian 
wells : cause of this — Used in Mecca and Japan — Led to the employment of animals to raise water 
— Simple mode of adapting them to this purpose in the east. Pulley and two buckets: used by 
the Anglo-Saxons, Normans, &c — Italian mode of raising water to upper floors — Desagulier's mode 
— Self-acting or gaining and losing buckets — Marquis of Worcester — Heron of Alexandria — Robert 
Fludd — Lever bucket engine — Bucket of Bologna — Materials of ancient buckets - - - 58 

CHAPTER X. 

The windlass: its origin unknown — Employed in raising water from wells, and ore from mines — 
Chinese windlass — Other inventions of that people, as table forks, winnowing machines, &c. &c. 
Fusee : its application to raise water from wells — Its inventor not known. Wheel and pinion — 
Anglo-Saxon crane — Drum attached to the windlass roller, and turned by a rope : used in Birmah, 
England, &c. Tread wheels : used by the ancients — Moved by men and various animals — Jacks 
— Horizontal tread-wheels — Common wheel or capstan. Observations on the introduction of table 
forks into Europe ---,--------68 

CHAPTER XI. 

Agriculture gave rise to numerous devices for raising water — Curious definition of Egyptian hus- 
bandry — Irrigation always practiced in the east — Great fertility of watered land — The construction 
of the lakes and canals of Egypt and China subsequent to the use of hydraulic machines — Pheno- 
menon in ancient Thebes — Similarity of the early histories of the Egyptians and Chinese — Mytho- 
logy based on agriculture and irrigation: both inculcated as a part of religion — Asiatic tanks — 
Watering land with the yoke and pots — An employment of the Israelites in Egypt — Hindoo water 
bearer — Curious shaped vessels — Aquarius, ' the water pourer,' an emblem of irrigation — Connec- 
tion of astronomy with agriculture — Swinging baskets of Egypt, China and Hindostan. Arts and 
customs of the ancient Egyptians - - - - - - -70 

CHAPTER XII. 
Gutters : single do. — double do. — Jantu of Hindostan : ingenious mode of working it — Referred to in 
Deuteronomy — Other Asiatic machines moved in a similar manner — its antiquity. Combination ol 
levers and gutters — Swinging or pendulum machine — Rocking gutters — Dutch scoop — Flash wheel 8S 

CHAPTER XIII. 
The swape : used in modern and ancient Egypt — Represented in sculptures at Thebes — Alluded to by 
Herodotus and Marcellus — Described by Pliny — Picotah of India: agility of the Hindoos in work- 
ing it. Chinese swape — Similar to the machines employed in erecting the pyramids — The swape 
seen in paradise by Mahomet — Figure of one near the city of Magnesia — Anglo-Saxon swape — 
Formerly used in English manufactories — Figures from the Nuremburg Chronicle, Munster's 
Cosmography, and Besson's Theatre des Instrumens. The swape common in North and South 
America — Examples of its use in watering gardens — Figures of it the oldest representations of any 
hydraulic machine — Mechanical speculations of ecclesiastics: Wilkins's projects for aerial navi- 
gation — Mechanical and theological pursuits combined in the middle ages — Gerbert — Dunstan — 
Bishops famous as castle architects — Audroides — Roode of grace — Shrine of Beckct — Speaking 
images — Chemical deceptions — Illuminated manuscripts - - - - - - 94 



CONTENTS. XI 



CHAPTER XIV. 



.Wheels for raising water— Machines described by Vitruvius— Tympanum— De La Faye's improve- 
ment.— Scoop wheel— Chinese nona— Roman do.— Egyptian do.— Noria with pots— Supposed 
origin of toothed wheels — Substitute for wheels and pinions — Persian wheel : common in Syria — 
Large ones at Hamath— Various modes of propelling the noria by men and animals— Early em- 
ployment of the latter to raise water. Antiquity of the noria— Supposed to be the * wheel of for- 
tune' — An appropriate emblem of abundance in Egypt — Sphinx — Lions' heads — Vases — Cornuco- 
pia—Ancient emblems of irrigation— Medea : inventress of vapor baths— Ctesibius — Metallic and 
glass mirrors — Barbers ----------- KW 

CHAPTER XV. 

The chain of pots — Its origin — Used, in Joseph's well at Cairo — Numerous in Egypt — Attempt of 
Belzoni to supersede it and the noria — Chain of pots of the Romans, Hindoos, Japanese and Euro- 
peans — Described by Agricola — Spanish one — Modern one — Applications of it to other purposes 
than raising water — Employed as a first mover and substitute for overshot wheels — Francini's ma 
chine — Antiquity of the chain of pots — Often confounded with the noria by ancient and modern 
authors — Introduced into Greece by Danaus — Opinions of modern writers on its antiquity — Refer- 
red to by Solomon — Babylonian engine that raised the water of the Euphrates to supply the hang- 
ing gardens — Rope pump — Hydraulic belt - - -- - - - - 123 

i 
CHAPTER XVI. 

The screw — An original device — Various modes of constructing it — Roman screw — Often re-invented 
— Introduced into England from Germany — Combination of several to raise water to great eleva- 
tions — Marquis of Worcester's proposition relating to it exemplified by M. Pattu — Ascent of water 
in it formerly considered inexplicable — Its history — Not invented by Archimedes — Supposed to 
have been in early use in Egypt — Vitruvius silent respecting its author — Conon its inventor or re- 
inventor — This philosopher famous for his flattery of Ptolemy and Berenice — Dinocratesthe archi- 
tect — Suspension of metallic substances without support — The screw not attributed to Archimedes 
till after his death — Inventions often given to others than their authors — Screws used as ship pumps 
by the Greeks — Flatterers like Conon too often found among men of science — Dedications of Eu- 
ropean writers often blasphemous — Hereditary titles and distinctions — Their acceptance unworthy 
of philosophers — Evil influence of scientific men in accepting them — Their denunciation a proof 
of the wisdom and virtue of the framers of the U. S. constitution — Their extinction in Europe de- 
sirable — Plato, Solon, and Socrates— George III — George IV — James Watt — Arago — Description 
of the • Syracusan,' a ship built by Archimedes, in which the screw pump was used - - 137 

CHAPTER XVII. 
The chain pump — Not mentioned by Vitruvius — Its supposed origin — Resemblance between it and 
the common pump — Not used by the Hindoos, Egyptians, Greeks or Romans — Derived from China 
— Description of the Chinese pump and the various modes of propelling it — Chain pump from Ag- 
ricola — Paternoster pumps — Chain pump of Besson — Old French pump from Belidor — Superiority 
of the Chinese pump — Carried by the Spaniards and Dutch to their Asiatic possessions — Best mode 
of making and using it — Wooden chains — Chain pump in British ships of war — Dampier — Modern 
improvements — Dutch pump — Cole's pump and experiments — Notice of chain pumps in the Ame- 
rican navy — Description of those in the U. S. ship Independence — Chinese pump introduced into 
America by VanBraam — Employed in South America — Recently introduced into Egypt — Used as 
a substitute for water wheels — Peculiar feature in Chinese ship building — Its advantages - - 148 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

On the hydraulic works of the ancient inhabitants of America : population of Anahuac — Ferocity of 
the Spanish invaders — Subject of ancient hydraulic works interesting — Aqueducts of the Toltecs — 
Ancient Mexican wells — Houses supplied with water by pipes — Palace of" Motezuma — Perfection 
of Mexican works in metals — Cortez — Market in ancient Mexico — Hydraulic works — Fountains 
and jets d'cau — Noria and other machines — Palenque : its aqueducts, hieroglyphics, &c. — Wells in 
ancient and modern Yucatan — Relics of former ages, and traditions of the Indians. Hydraulic 
works of the Peruvians: Customs relating to water — Humanity of the early incas — Aqueducts and 
reservoirs — Resemblance of Peruvian and Egyptian customs — Garcilasso — Civilization in Peru 
before the times of the incas — Giants — Wells — Stupendous aqueducts and other monuments — 
Atabalipa — Pulleys — Cisterns of gold and silver in the houses of the incas — Temples and gardens 
supplied by pipes — Temple at Cusco : its water-works and utensils — Embroidered cloth— Manco 
Capac - - -- -159 

BOOK II. 

MACHINES FOR RAISING WATER BY THE PRESSURE OP THE ATMOSPHERE. 

CHAPTER 1. 

On machines that raise water by atmospheric pressure — Principle of their action formerly unknown 
— Suction a chimera — Ascent of water in pumps incomprehensible without a knowledge of atmo- 
spheric pressure— Phenomena in the organization, habits and motions of animals— Rotation of the 
atmosphere with the earth— Air tangible— Compressible— Expansible— Elastic — Air beds— Ancient 
beds and bedsteads — Weight of air — Its pressure — Examples — American Indians and the air pump 
— Boa constrictor — Swallowing oysters — Shooting bullets by the rarefaction of air — Boy's sucker — 
Suspension of flies against gravity — Lizards — Frogs — Walrus — Connection between all depart- 
ments of knowledge — Sucking fish — Remora — Lampreys — Dampier — Christopher Columbus at St. 
Domingo — Ferdinand Columbus — Ancient fable — Sudden expansion of air bursting the bladders 
offish — Pressure of the atmosphere on liquids - - - - - . - -173 

CHAPTER II. 
Discovery of atmospheric pressure— Circumstances which led to it— Galileo — Torricelli— Beautiful 
experiment of the latter — Controversy respecting the results— Pascal — His demonstration of the 



K»l CONTENTS. 

cause of the ascent of water in pumps — Invention of the air pump — Barometer and its various ap 
plications — Intensity of atmospheric pressure different at different parts of the earth — A knowledge 
of this necessary to pump makers — The limits to which water may be raised in atmospheric pumps 
known to ancient pump makers ----•--... 187 

CHAPTER III. 

Ancient experiments on air — Various applications of it — Siphons used in ancient Egypt — Primitive 
experiments with vessels inverted in water — Suspension of liquids in them — Ancient atmospheric 
sprinkling pot — Watering gardens with it — Probably referred to by St. Paul, and also by Shake- 
speare — Glass sprinkling vessel and wine taster from Pompeii — Religious uses of sprinkling pots 
among the ancient heathen — Figure of one from Montfaucon — Vestals — Miracle of Tutia carrying 
water in a sieve described and explained — Modern liquor taster and dropping tubes — Trick per- 
formed with various liquids by a Chinese juggler — Various frauds of the ancients with liquids — 
Divining cups ----»-----.. 191 

CHAPTER IV. 

Suction : impossible to raise liquids by that which is so called — Action of the muscles of the thorax 
and abdomen in sucking explained — Two kinds of suction — Why the term is continued — Sucking 
poison from wounds — Cupping and cupping horns — Ingenuity of a raven — Sucking tubes original 
atmospheric pumps — The sanguisuchello — Peruvian mode of taking tea by sucking it through 
tubes — Reflections on it — New application of such tubes suggested — Explanation of an ambiguous 
proverbial expression -------.-.. 201 

CHAPTER V. 

On bellows pumps: great variety in the forms and materials of machines to raise water — Simple 
bellows pump — Ancient German pump — French pump — Gosset's frictionless pump: subsequently 
re-invented — Martin's pump — Robison's bag pump — Disadvantages of bellows pumps — Natural 
pumps in men, quadrupeds, insects, birds, &c. — Reflections on them. Ancient vases figured in 
this chapter .......... .205 

CHAPTER VI. 

The atmospheric pump supposed by some persons to be of modern origin — Injustice towards the 
ancients — Their knowledge of hydrodynamics — Absurdity of an alledged proof of their ignorance 
of a simple principle of hydrostatics — Common cylindrical pump — Its antiquity — Anciently known 
under the name of a siphon — The antlia of the Greeks — Used as a ship pump by the Romans — 
Bilge pump — Portable pumps — Wooden pumps always used in ships — Description of some in the 
U. S. Navy — Ingenuity of sailors— Singular mode of making wooden pumps, from Dampier — Old 
draining pump — Pumps in public and private wells — In mines — Pump from Agricola, with figures 
of various boxes — Double pump formerly used in the mines of Germany, from Fludd's works — 
The wooden pump not improved by the moderns — Its use confined chiefly to civilized states - 211 

CHAPTER VII. 

Metallic pumps— Of more extended application than those of wood — Description of one — Devices to 
prevent water in them from freezing — Wells being closed, no obstacle in raising water from them 
— Application of the atmospheric pump to draw water from great distances as well as depth — Sin- 
gular circumstance attending the trial of a Spanish pump in Seville— Excitement produced by it — 
Water raised to great elevations by atmospheric pressure when mixed with air — Deceptions prac- 
ticed on this principle — Device to raise water fifty feet by atmospheric pressure — Modifications of 
the pump innumerable — Pumps with two pistons — French marine pump — Curved pump — Musch- 
enbroeck's pump — Centrifugal pump — West's pump — Jorge's improvement — Original centrifugal 
pomp — Ancient buckets figured in this chapter .__.-. 221 



BOOK III. 

MACHINES FOR RAISING WATER BY COMPRESSURE INDEPENDENTLY OF 
ATMOSPHERIC INFLUENCE. 

CHAPTER I. 
Definition of machines described in this Book— Forcing pumps — Analogy between them and bellows 
— History of the bellows that of the pump — Forcing pumps are water bellows — The bellows of ante- 
diluvian origin— Tubal Cain— Anacharsis— Vulcan in his forge— Egyptian, Hindoo, and Peruvian 
blowing tubes — Primitive bellows of goldsmiths inBarbary — Similar instruments employed to eject 
liquids — Deuces to obtain a continuous blast — Double bellows of the Fonlah blacksmiths without 
valves — Simpu Asiatic bellows— Domestic bellows of modern Egypt— Double bellows of the an- 
cient Egyptians- Bellows blowers in the middle ages— Lantern bellows common over all the east — 
Specimens from Agricola— Used W negroes in the interior of Africa— Modern Egyptian black- 
smiths' bellows— Vulcuc's bellows— Various kinds of Roman bellows— Bellows of Grecian black- 
smiths referred to in a prediction of the Delphic oracle— Application of lantern bellows as forcing 
pnmps— Sucking and forcing bellows pumps— Modern domestic bellows of ancient origin — Used 
to raise water— Common blacksmiths' bellows employed as forcing pumps— Ventilation of mines 231 

CHAPTER II. 
Piston bellows: used in water organs— Engraved on a medal of Valentinian— Used in Asia and Af- 
rica. Bellows of Madagascar. Chinese bellows: account of two in the Philadelphia museum- 
Remarks on a knowledge of the pump among the ancient Chinese— Chinese bellows similar in 
their construction to the water forcer of Ctesibius, the double acting pump of La Hire, the cylin- 
drical steam engine, and condensing and exhausting air pumps. Double acting bellows of Mada- 
gascar— Alledged ignorance of the old Peruvian and Mexican smiths of bellows: tbeir constant 
use of blowing tubes no proof of this— Examples from Asiatic gold and silver smiths— Balsas— 
Sarbacans — Mexican Vulcan. Natural bellows pumps : blowing apparatus of the whale — Elephant— 



CONTENTS. Xlll 

Rise and descent of marine animals— Jaculator fish— Llama— Spurting snake— Lamprey— Bees— 
The heart of man and animals— Every human being a living pump : wonders of its mechanism, 
. and of the duration of its motions and materials— Advantages of studying the mechanism of ani- 
mals - - - - a 44 

CHAPTER III. 

Forcing pumps with solid pistons : the syringe : its uses, materials and antiquity — Employed by the 
Hindoos in religious festivals— Figured on an old coat of arms — Simple garden pump —Single valve 
forcing pump— Common forcing pump — Stomach pump— Forcing pump with air vessel— Machine 
of Ctesibius : its description by Vitruvius— Remarks on its origin— Errors of the ancients respect- 
ing the authors of several inventions — Claims of Ctesibius to the pump limited — Air vessel probably 
invented by him — Compressed air a prominent feature in all his inventions — Air vessels — In He- 
ron's fountain— Apparently referred to by Pliny — Air gun of Ctesibius— The hookah - - 259 

CHAPTER IV. 

Forcing pumps continued: La Hire's double acting pump— Plunger pump: invented by Moreland ; 
the most valuable of modern improvements on the pump — Application of it to other purposes than 
raising water — Frictionless plunger pump — Quicksilver pumps — Application of the principle of 
Bramah's press by bees in forcing honey into their cells. Forcing pumps with hollow pistons : 
employed in French water works — Specimen from the works at Notre Dame — Lifting pump from 
Agricola— Modern lifting pumps — Extract from an old pump-maker's circular— Lifting pumps with 
two pistons — Combination of hollow and solid pistons — Trevethick's pump — Perkins's pump - 271 

CHAPTER V. 

Rotary or rotatory pumps : uniformity in efforts made to improve machines — Prevailing custom to 
convert rectilinear and reciprocating movements into circular ones — Epigram of Antipater — An- 
cient opinion respecting circular motions — Advantages of rotary motions exemplified in various 
machines — Operations of spinning and weaving; historical anecdotes respecting them — Rotary 
pump from Serviere — Interesting inventions of his — Classification of rotary pumps — Eve's steam 
engine and pump — Another class of rotary pumps — Rotary pump of the 16th century — Pump with 
sliding butment — Trotter's engine and pump — French rotary pump — Bramah and Dickensou's 
pump — Rotary pumps with pistons in the form of vanes — Centrifugal pump — Defects of rotary 
pumps — Reciprocating rotary pumps: a French one — An English one — Defects of these pumps - 281 

CHAPTER VI. 

Application of pumps in modern water works : first used by the Germans — Water works at Augs- 
burgh and Bremen — Singular android in the latter city — Old water works at Toledo — At London 
Bridge — Other London works moved by horses, water, wind and steam — Water engine at Exeter — 
Water works erected on Pont Neuf and Pont Notre Dame at Paris — Celebrated works at Marli — 
Error of Rannequin in making them unnecessarily complex. American water works : a history 
of them desirable — Introduction of pumps into wells in New-York city — Extracts from the minutes 
of the Common Council previous to the war of independence — Public water works proposed and 
commenced in 1774 — Treasury notes issued to meet the expense — Copy of one — Manhattan Com- 
pany — Water works at Fairmount, Philadelphia - _.._.. 0,93 

CHAPTER VII. 

Fire engines : probably used in Babylon and Tyre — Employed by ancient warriors — Other devices 
of theirs — Fire engines referred to by Apollodorus — These probably equal in effect to ours : Spiri- 
taliaof Heron: fire engine described in it — Pumps used to promote conflagrations — Greek fire a 
liquid projected by pumps — Fires and wars commonly united — Generals the greatest incendiaries 
— Saying of Crates respecting them — Fire pumps the forerunners of guns — Use of engines in Rome 
— Mentioned in a letter of Pliny to Trajan, and by Seneca, Hesychius, and Isidore. Roman fire- 
men—Frequency of fires noticed by Juvenal — Detestable practice of Crassus — Portable engines in 
Roman houses — Modern engines derived from the Spiritalia — Forgotten in the middle ages — Su- 
perstitions with regard to fires — Fires attributed to demons — Consecrated bells employed as sub- 
stitutes for water and fire engines — Extracts from the Pari6 ritual, Wynken de Worde, Barnaby 
Googe and Peter Martyr respecting them — Emblematic device of an old duke of Milan — Firemen's 
apparatus from Agricola — Syringes used in London to quench fires in the 17th century — Still em- 
ployed in Constantinople — Anecdote of the Capudan Pacha — Syringe engine from Besson — Ger- 
man engines of the 16th century — Pump engine from Decaus — Pump engines in London — Extracts 
from the miuutes of the London Common Council respecting engines and squirts in 1667 — Experi- 
ment of Maurice mentioned by Stow the historian— Extract from « a history of the first inventers' 302 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Fire engines continued: engines by Hautsch — Nuremberg — Fire engines at Strasbourg and Ypres — 
Coupling screws — Old engine with air chamber — Canvas and leather hose and Dutch engines — 
Engines of Perier and Leopold — Old English engines — Newsham's engines — Modern French engine 
— Air chambers — Table of the height of jets — Modes of working fire engines — Engines worked by 
steam. Fire engines in America: regulations respecting fires in New Amsterdam — Proclamations 
of Governor Stuyvesant — Extracts from old minutes of the Common Council — First fire engines — 
Philadelphia and New-York engines — Riveted hose — Steam fire engines now being constructed. 
Devices to extinguish fire without engines — Water bombs — Protecting buildings from fire — Fire 
escapes — Couvre feu — Curfew bells — Measuring time with candles — Ancient laws respecting fires 
and incendiaries — The dress in which Roman incendiaries were burnt retained in the auto da fs - 323 

CHAPTER IX. 
Pressure engines: of limited application — Are modifications of gaining and losing buckets and 
pumps — Two kinds of pressure engines — Piston pressure engine described by Fludd — Pressure 
engine from Belidor— Another by VVestgarth — Motive pressure engines — These exhibit a novel 
mode of employing Water as a motive agent — Variety of applications of a piston and cylinder — 
Causes of the ancients being ignorant of the steam engine— Secret of making improvements in the 



XIV CONTENTS. 

arts — Fulton, Eli Whitney, and Arkwright — Pressure engines might have been anticipated, and 
valuable lessons in science may be derived from a disordered pump — Archimedes — Heron's foun- 
tain — Portable ones recommended iu flower gardens and drawing rooms in hot weather — Their 
invention gave rise to a new class of hydraulic engines — Pressure engine at Chemnitz — Another 
modification of Heron's fountain — Spiral pump of Wirtz - _ . -352 

BOOK IV. 

MACHINES FOR RAISING WATER (CHIEFLY OF MODERN ORIGIN) INCLUDING EARLY 
APPLICATIONS OF STEAM FOR THAT PURPOSE. 

CHAPTER I. 

Devices of the lower animals — Some animals aware that force is increased by the space through 
which a body moves — Birds drop shell fish from great elevations to break the shells — Death of 
JCsohylus — Combats between the males of sheep and goats — Military ram of the ancients — Water 
rums — Waves — Momentum acquired by running water — Examples — Whitehurst's machine — Hy- 
draulic ram of Montgolfier — ' Canne hydraulique' and its modifications ... -365 

CHAPTER II. 

Machines for raising water by fire : air machines — Ancient weather glasses — Dilatation of air by 
heat and condensation by cold — Ancient Egyptian air machines — Statue of Memnon — Statues of 
Serapis and the Bird of Memnon — Decaus's and Kircher's machinery to account for the sounds of 
the Theban idol — Remarks on the statue of Memnon — Machine for raising water by the sun's heat, 
from Heron — Similar machines in the 16th century — Air machines by Porta and Decaus — Distilling 
by the sun's heat — Musical air machines by Drebble and Decaus — Air machines acted on by ordi- 
nary fire — Modifications of them employed in ancient altars — Bronze altars — Tricks performed by 
the heathen priests with fire — Others by heated air and vapor — Bellows employed in ancient altars 
— Tricks performed at altars mentioned by Heron — Altar that feeds itself with flame from Heron — 
Ingenuity displayed by ancient priests—Secrets of the temples — The Spiritalia — Sketch of its 
contents — Curious lustral vaso .-.--.---- 374 

• CHAPTER III. 

On steam : miserable condition of the great portion of the human race in past times — Brighter pros- 
pects for posterity — Inorganic motive forces — Wonders of steam — Its beneficial influence on man's 
future destiny — Will supersede nearly all human drudgery — Progress of the arts — Cause why steam 
was not formerly employed — Pots boiling over and primitive experiments by females — Steam an 
agent in working prodigies — Priests familiar with steam — Sacrifices boiled — Seething bones — 
Earthquakes — Anthemius and Zeno — Hot baths at Rome — Ball supported on a jet of steam, from 
the Spiritalia — Heron's whirling eolipile — Steam engines on the same principle — Eolipiles de- 
scribed by Vitruvius — Their various uses — Heraldic device — Eolipiles from Rivius — Cupelo fur- 
nace and eolipile from Erckers — Similar applications of steam revived and patented — Eolipiles of 
the human form — Ancient tenures — Jack of Hilton — Puster a steam deity of the ancient Germans — 
Ingenuity of the priests in constructing and working it — Supposed allusions to eolipilic idols in the 
Bible — Employed in ancient wars to project streams of liquid fire — Draft of chimneys improved, 
perfumes dispersed, and music produced by eolipiles — Eolipiles the germ of modern steam engines 388 

CHAPTER IV. 

Employment of steam in former times — Claims of various people to the steam engine — Application 
of steam as a motive agent perceived by Roger Bacon — Other modern inventions and discoveries 
known to him — Spanish steam ship in 1543 — Official documents relating to it — Remarks on these — 
Antiquity of paddle wheels as propellers— Project of the author for propelling vessels — Experi- 
ments on steam in the 16th century — Jerome Cardan — Vacuum formed by the condensation of 
steam known to the alchymists— Experiments from Fludd— Others from Porta— Expansive force 
of steam illustrated by old authors— Interesting example of raising water by steam from Porta — 
Mathesius, Canini and Besson — Device for raising hot water from Decaus — Invention of the steam 
engine claimed by Arago for France — Nothing new in the apparatus of Decaus nor in the principle 
of its operation — Hot springs— Geysers — Boilers with tubular spouts — Eolipiles— Observations on 
Decaus— Writings of Porta— Claims of Arago in behalf of Decaus untenable— Instances of hot wa- 
ter raised by steam in the arts — Manufacture of soap — Discovery of iodine — Ancient soap makers — 
Soap vats in Pompeii — Manipulations of ancient mechanics — Loss of ancient writings — Large 
sums anciently expended on soap — Logic of Omar . - . - 402 

CHAPTER V. 
Few inventions formerly recorded — Lord Bacon — His project for draining mines — Thomas Bushell — 
be produced by hydraulic machines — Eolipiles — Branca's application of the blast of one to pro- 
duce motion — Its inutility — Curious extract from Wilkins — Ramseye's patent for raising water by 
fire — Manufacture of nitre — Figure illustrating the application of steam, from an old English work 
— Kircher's device for raising water by steam — John Bate — Antiquity of boys' kites in England — 
Discovery of atmospheric pressure — Engine of motion — Anecdotes of Oliver Evans and John Fitch 
— Elasticity and condensation of steam — Steam engines modifications of guns — A moving piston 
the essential feature in both — Classification of modern steam engines — Guerricke's apparatus — 
The same adopted in steam engines — Guerricke one of the authors of the steam engine - - 418 

CHAPTER VI. 

Reasons of old inventors for concealing their discoveries — Century of Inventions — Marquis of Wor- 
cester — His Inventions matured before the civil wars — Several revived since his death — Problems 
in the 'Century' in older authors — Bird roasting itself— Imprisoning chair — Portable fortifications 
—Flying— Diving — Drebble's sub-marine ship — The 68th problem — This remarkably explicit — 
The device consisted of one boiler and two receivers — The receivers charged by atmospheric 
pressure— Three and four-way cocks — An hydraulic machine of Worcester mentioned by Cosmo 



CONTENTS. XV 

de Medicis— Worcester's machine superior to preceding ones, and similar to Savery's — Piston steam 
engine also made by him — Copy of the last jhree problems in the Century — Ingenious mode of 
6tating them— Forcing pumps worked by steam engines intended— Ancient riddle — Steam boat 
invented by Worcester — Projectors despised in his time — Patentees caricatured in a public pro- 
cession—Neglect of Worcester— His death — Persecution of his widow — Worcester one of the 
greatest mechanicians of any age or nation— Glauber ------- 427 

CHAPTER VII. 
Hautefeuille, Huyghens and Hooke— Moreland — His table of cylinders — His pumps worked by a 
cylindrical high- pressure steam engine — He made no claim to a steam engine in England — Simple 
device by which he probably worked his plunger pumps — Inventions of his at Vauxhall — Anecdote 
of him from Evelyn's Diary — Early steam projectors courtiers — Ridiculous origin of some honors — 
Edict of Nantes — Papin — Digesters — Safety valve — Papin's plan to transmit power through pipes 
by means of air — Cause of its failure — Another plan by compressed air — Papin's experiments to 
move a piston by gunpowder and by steam— The latter abandoned by him — The safety valve im- 
proved, not invented by Papin — Mercurial safety valves — Water lute— Steam machine of Papin for 
raising water and imparting motion to machinery - - - - - - - 441 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Experimenters contemporary with Papin — Savery — This engineer publishes his inventions — His 
oroject for propelling vessels — Ridicules the surveyor of the navy for opposing it — His first expe- 
riments on steam made in a tavern — Account of them by Desaguliers and Switzer — Savery's first 
engine — Its operation — Engine with a single receiver — Savery's improved engine described — Gauge 
cocks — Excellent features of his improved engine — Its various parts connected by coupling screws 
— Had no safety valve — Rejected by miners on account of the danger from the boilers exploding — 
Solder melted by steam — Opinions respecting the origin of Savery's engine — It bears no relation to 
the piston engine — Modifications of Savery's engine by Desaguliers, Leopold, Blakey and others — 
Rivatz — Engines by Gensanne — De Moura — De Rigny — Francois and others — Amonton's fire mill 
— Newcomen and Cawley — Their engine superior to Savery's — Newcomen acquainted with the 
previous experiments of Papin — Circumstances favorable to the introduction of Newcomen's en- 
gine — Description of it — Condensation by injection discovered by chance — Chains and sectors — 
Savery's claim to a share in Newcomen's patent an unjust one — Merits of Newcomen and Cawley 453 

CHAPTER IX. 
General adoption of Newcomen and Cawley's engine — Leopold's machine — Steam applied as a mover 
of general machinery — Wooden and granite boilers — Generating steam by the heat of the sun — 
Floats — Greenhouses and dwellings heated by steam — Cooking by steam — Explosive engines — 
Vapor engines — English, French, and American motive engines — Woisard's air machine — Vapor 
of mercury— Liquefied gases — Decomposition and recomposition of water - - - -468 



BOOK V. 

NOVEL DEVICES FOR RAISING WATER, WITH AN ACCOUNT OF SIPHONS, COCKS, 
VALVES, CtEPSYDR-E, &C &C 

CHAPTER I. 

Subjects treated in the fifth book — Lateral communication of motion — This observed by the ancients 
— Wind at the Falls of Niagara — The trombe described — Natural trombes — Tasting hot liquids — 
Waterspouts — Various operations of the human mouth — Currents of water — Gulf Stream — Large 
rivers — Adventures of a bottle — Experiments of Venturi — Expenditure of water from various 
formed ajutages — Contracted vein — Cause of increased discharge from conical tubes — Sale of a 
water power — Regulation of the ancient Romans to prevent an excess of water from being drawn 
by pipes from the aqueducts .---.-..-- 475 

CHAPTER II. 
Water raised by currents of air — Fall of the barometer duriug storms — Hurricanes commence at the 
leeward — Damage done by storms not always by the impulse of the wind — Vacuum produced by 
storms of wind — Draft of chimneys — Currents of wind in houses — Fire grates and parabolic jambs 
— Experiments with a sheet of paper—Experiments with currents of air through tubes variously 
connected — Effect of conical ajutages to blowing tubes — Application of these tubes to increase the 
draft of chimneys, and to ventilate wells, mines and ships ------ 481 

CHAPTER III. 

Vacuum by currents of steam — Various modes of applying them in blowing tubes — Experiments- 
Effects of conical ajutages — Results of slight changes in the position of vacuum tubes within blow- 
ing ones — Double blowing tube — Experiments with it — Raising water by currents of steam — Ven- 
tilation of mines — Experimental apparatus for concentrating sirups in vacuo— Drawing air through 
liquids to promote their evaporation — Remarks on the origin of obtaining a vacuum by currents of 
steam ---...--...-. 489- 

CHAPTER IV. 

Spouting tubes — Water easily disturbed — Force economically transmitted by the oscillation of liquids 
— Experiments on the ascent of water in differently shaped tubes — Application of one form to si- 
phons — Movement given to spouting tubes — These produce a jet both by their ascent and descent 
— Experiments with plain conical tubes — Spouting tubes with air pipes attached — Experiments 
with various sized tubes — Observations respecting their movements — Advantages arising from 
inertia— Modes of communicating motion to spouting tubes — Purposes for which they are applica- 
ble—The souffleur -497 



XVI CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER V. 



Nature's devices for raising water — Their influence — More common than other natural operations— 
The globe a self-moving hydraulic engine — Streams flowing on its surface — Others ejected from 
its bowels — Subterranean cisterns, tubes and siphons — Intermitting springs — Natural rams and 
pressure engines — Eruption of water on the coast of Italy — Water raised in vapor — Clouds — Wa- 
ter raised by steam — Geysers — Earthquakes — Vegetation — Advantages of studying it — Erroneous 
views of future happiness — Circulation of sap — This fluid wonderfully varied in its effects and 
movements — Pitcher plant and Peruvian canes — Trees of Australia — Endosmosis — Waterspouts — 
Ascent of liquids by capillary attraction — Tenacity and other properties of liquids — Ascent of 
liquids up inclined planes — Liquid drops — Their uniform diffusion when not counteracted by 
gravity — Their form and size — Soft and hard soldering — Ascent of water in capillary tubes limited 
only by its volume — Cohesion of liquids— Ascent of water through sand and rags — Rise of oil in 
lamp wicks and through the pores of boxwood -----..« 505 

CHAPTER VI. 

Siphons — Mode of charging them — Principle on which their action depends — Cohesion of liquids — 
Siphons act in vacuo — Variety of siphons — Their antiquity— Of eastern origin — Portrayed in the 
tombs at Thebes — Mixed wines — Siphons in ancient Egyptian kitchens — Probably used at the feast 
at Cana — Their application by old jugglers — Siphons from Heron's Spiritalia — Tricks with liquids 
of different specific gravities — Fresh water dipped from the surface of the sea — Figures of Tanta- 
lus's cups — Tricks of old publicans — Magic pitcher — Goblet for unwelcome visitors — Tartar necro- 
mancy with cups — Roman baths — Siphons used by the ancients for tasting wine — Siphons, A. D. 
1511 — Figures of modern siphons — Sucking tube — Valve siphon — Tin plate — Wirtemburg siphon — 
Argand's siphon — Chemists' siphons — Siphons by the author — Water conveyed over extensive 
grounds by siphons — Limit of the application of siphons known to ancient plumbers — Error of 
Porta and other writers respecting siphons — Decaus — Siphons for discharging liquids at the bend 
-Ram siphon ..--.--.-..- 514 

CHAPTER VII. 

Fountains: variety of their forms, ornaments and accompaniments — Landscape gardeners — Curious 
fountains from Decaus — Fountains in old Rome — Water issuing from statues — Fountains in Pom- 
peii — Automaton trumpeter — Fountains by John of Bologna and M. Angelo— Old fountains in Nu- 
remberg, Augsburg and Brussels — Shakespeare, Drayton andSpencer quoted — Fountains of Alci- 
nous — The younger Pliny's account of fountains in the gardens of his Tuscan villa — Eating in 
gardens — Alluded to in Solomon's Song — Cato the Censor — Singular fountains in Italy — Fountains 
described by Marco Paulo and other old writers — Predilection for artificial trees in fountains — 
Perfumed and musical fountains — Fountains within public and private buildings — Enormous cost 
of perfumed waters at Roman feasts — Lucan quoted — Introduction of fountains into modern thea- 
tres and churches recommended — Fountains in the apartments of eastern princes — Water conveyed 
through pipes by the ancients into fields for the use of their cattle — Three and four-way cocks - 532 

CHAPTER VIII. 

C'opsydrae and hydraulic organs : Time measured by the sun — Obelisks — Dial in Syracuse — Time 
measured in the night by slow matches, candles, &c. — Modes of announcing the hours — " Jack of 
the clock" — Clepsydrae — Their curious origin in Egypt — Their variety — Used by the Siamese, 
Hindoos, Chinese, &c. — Ancient hourglasses — Indexes to water clocks — Sand clocks in China — 
Musical clock of Plato — Clock carried in triumph by Pompey — Clepsydra of Ctesibius — Clock pre- 
sented to Charles V — Modern clepsydrae — Hourglasses in coffins — Dial of the Peruvians. Hydrau- 
lic organs : imperfectly described by Heron and Vitruvius — Plato, Archimedes, Plutarch, Pliny, 
Suetonius, St. Jerome — Organs sent from Constantinople to Pepin — Water organs of Louis Debon- 
naire — A woman expired in ecstasies while hearing one play— Organs made by monks — Old Regal 542 

CHAPTER IX. 

8heet lead: Lead early known — Roman pig lead — Ancient uses of lead — Leaden and iron coffins — 
Casting sheet lead — Solder — Leaden books — Roofs covered with lead — Invention of rolled lead — 
Lead sheathing. Leaden pipes: of great antiquity — Made from sheet lead by the Romans — Ordi- 
nance of Justinian — Leaden pipes in Spain in the 9th century — Damascus — Leather pipes — Modern 
iron pipes — Invention of cast leaden pipes — Another plan in France — Joints united without solder — 
Invention of drawn leaden pipes — Burr's mode of making leaden pipes — Antiquity of window lead 
— Water injured bypassing through leaden pipes — Tinned pipes. Valves: their antiquity and 
variety — Nuremberg engineers. Cocks: of great variety and materials in ancient times — Hora- 
pollo — Cocks attached to the laver of brass and the brazen sea — Also to golden and silver cisterns 
in the temple at Delphi — Found in Japanese baths — Figure of an ancient bronze cock — Superior 
in its construction to modern ones — Cock from a Roman fountain — Numbers found at Pompeii — 
Silver pipes and cocks in Roman baths — Golden and silver pipes and cocks in Peruvian baths — 
Sliding cocks by the author. Water closets : of ancient date — Common in the east. Traps for 
drains, &c. -..-..-.-.... 550 



APPENDIX. 

John Bate— Phocion— Well worship— Wells with stairs — Tonrne-broche— Raising water by a screw 
— Perpetual motions — Chain pumps in ships — Sprinkling pots — Old frictionless pump — Water 
power— Vulcan's trip-hammers — Eolipiles — Blowpipe — Philosophical bellows — Charging eolipilos 
— Eolipilic idols referred to in the Bible— Palladium — Laban's images— Expansive force of steam — 
Steam aud air — Windmills — Imprisoning chairs — Eolipilic war-machines - 565 

INDEX - - 575 



A DESCRIPTIVE 

AND 

HISTORICAL ACCOUNT 

OF 

HYDRAULIC AND OTHER MACHINES 

FOR RAISING WATER. 



BOOK I. 

PRIMITIVE AND ANCIENT DEVICES FOR RAISING WATER. 



CHAPTER I. 

The subject of raising water, interesting to Philosophers and Mechanics — Led to the invention of the 
Steam Engine — Connected with the present advanced state of the Arts — Origin of the useful arts lost— 
Their history neglected by the Ancients — First Inventors the greatest benefactors — Memorials of them 
perished, while accounts of warriors and their acts pervade and pollute the pages of history — A record 
of the origin and early progress of the arts more useful and interesting than all the works of historians 
extant — The history of a single tool, (as that of a hammer,) invaluable — In the general wreck of the 
arts of the ancients, most of their devices for raising water preserved — Cause of this — Hydraulic ma- 
chines of very remote origin — Few invented by the Greeks and Romans — Arrangement and division of 
the subject. 

Although the subject of this work may present nothing very alluring 
to the general reader, it is not destitute of interest to the philosopher and 
intelligent mechanic. The art of raising water has ever been closely 
connected with the progress of man in civilization, so much so, indeed, 
that the state of this art, among a people, may be taken as an index of 
their position on the scale of refinement. It is also an art, which, from 
its importance called forth the ingenuity of man in the infancy of soci- 
ety ; nor is it improbable, that it originated some of the simple machines, 
or mechanic powers themselves. 

It was a favorite subject of research with eminent mathematicians and 
engineers of old ; and the labors of their successors in modern days, have 
been rewarded with the most valuable machine which the arts ever pre- 
sented to man — the STEAM ENGINE — for it was " raising of water" 
that exercised the ingenuity of Decaus and Worcester, Moreland and 
Papin, Savary and Newcomen; and those illustrious men, whose suo- 



2 Ancient Arts. [Book 1. 

cessive labors developed and matured that " semi-omnipotent engine,' ' 
which " driveth up water by fire." A machine that has already greatly 
changed and immeasurably improved the state of civil society ; and one 
which, in conjunction with the printing press, is destined to renovate 
both the political and moral world. The subject is therefore, intimately 
connected with the present advanced state of the arts ; and the amazing 
progress made in them during the last two centuries, may be attributed 
in some degree to its cultivation. 

The origin and early history of this art, (and of all others of primitive 
times) are irrecoverably lost. Tradition has scarcely preserved a single 
anecdote or circumstance relating to those meritorious men, with whom 
any of the useful arts originated ; and when in process of time, history 
took her station in the temple of science, her professors deemed it beneath 
her dignity, to record the actions and lives of men, who were merely in- 
ventors of machines, or improvers of the useful arts ; thus nearly all 
knowledge of those to whom the world is under the highest of obliga- 
tions, has perished forever. 

The scholar mourns, and the antiquary weeps over the wreck of 
ancient learning and art — the philosopher regrets that sufficient of both 
has not been preserved to elucidate several interesting discoveries, which 
history has mentioned ; nor to prove that those principles of science, upon 
which the action of some old machines depended, were understood ; and 
the mechanic inquires in vain for the processes by which his predecessors 
in remote ages, worked the hardest granite without iron, transported it 
in masses that astound us, and used them in the erection of stupendous 
buildings, apparently with the facility that modern workmen lay bricks, 
or raise the lintels of doors. The machines by which they were elevated 
are as unknown as the individuals who directed their movements. We 
are almost as ignorant of their modes of working the metals, of their al- 
loys which rivalled steel in hardness, of their furnaces, crucibles, and 
moulds ; the details of forming the ennobling statue, or the more useful 
skillet or cauldron. Did the ancients laminate metal between rollers, and 
draw wire through plates, as we do 1 or, was it extended by hammers, as 
some specimens of both seem to show? 3 On these and a thousand other 
subjects, much uncertainty prevails. Unfortunately learned men of old, 
deemed it a part of wisdom, to conceal from the vulgar, all discoveries in 
science. With this view, they wrapped them in mystical figures, that 
the people might not apprehend them. The custom was at one time so 
general, that philosophers refused to leave any thing in writing, explana- 
tory of their researches. 

Whenever we attempt to penetrate that obscurity which conceals from 
our view, the works of the ancients, we are led to regret, that some of 
their mechanics did not undertake, for the sake of posterity and their 
owr fame, to write a history and description of their machines and manu- 
factures. 

We know that philosophers, generally, would not condescend to per- 
form such a task, or stoop to acquire the requisite information, for they 
deemed it discreditable to apply their energies and learning, to the eluci- 
dation of such subjects. (Few could boast with Hippias — who was master 
of the liberal and mechanical arts — the ring on his finger, the tunic, cloak, 

a " And they did beat the gold into thin plates, and cut it into wires." Exod. xxxix, 3. 
These plates, were probably similar to those made by the ancient goldsmiths of Mexico, 
which were " three quarters of a yard long, foure fingers broad, and as thicke as parch- 
ment." Purchas' Pilgrimage, 984. "Silver spread into plates, is brought from Tarshish, 
and gold from Uphaz." Jer. x, 9. 



Chap. l.J History polluted with accounts of Warriors. 3 

and shoes which he wore, were the work of his own hands.) Plato in 
.veighed with great indignation against Archytas and Eudoxus, for having 
debased and corrupted the excellency of geometry, by mechanical so- 
lutions, causing her to descend, as he said, from incorporeal and intellec- 
tual to sensible things ; and obliging her to make use of matter, which re- 
quires manual labor, and is the object of servile trades. a 

To the prevalence of such unphilosophical notions amongst the learned 
men of old, may be attributed, the irretrievable loss of information re- 
specting the prominent mechanics of the early ages, those 

" Searching wits, 

Who graced their age with new invented arts." Virgil, En. vi, 900. 

Their works, their inventions, and their names, are buried beneath the 
waves of oblivion ; whilst the light and worthless memorials of heroes, 
falsely so called, have floated on the surface, and history has become pol- 
luted with tainted descriptions of men, who, without having added an 
atom to the wealth, or to the happiness of society, have been permitted 
to riot on the fruit of other men's labors ; to wade in the blood of their 
species, and to be heralded as the honorable of the earth ! And still, as 
in former times, humanity shudders, at these monsters being held up, as 
they impiously are, to the admiration of the world, and even by some 
christians too, as examples for our children. 

" We may reasonably hope," says Mr. Davies in his popular work on 
the Chinese, " that the science and civilization which have already greatly 
enlarged the bounds of our knowledge of foreign countries, may, by 
diminishing the vulgar admiration of such pests and scourges of the 
human race, as military conquerors have usually proved, advance and fa- 
cilitate the peaceful intercourse of the most remote countries with each 
other, and thereby increase the general stock of Itnozvledge and happiness 
among mankind." Vol. 1, 18. 

"Of what utility to us at this day, is either Nimrod, Cyrus, or Alexan- 
der, or their successors, who have astonished mankind from time to time ? 
With all their magnificence and vast designs, they are returned into nothing 
with regard to us. They are dispersed like vapors, and have vanished 
like phantoms. But the inventors of the arts and sciences labored 
for all ages. We still enjoy the fruits of their application and industry — 
they have procured for us, all the conveniencies of life — they have con- 
verted all nature to our uses. Yet, all our admiration turns generally on 
the side of those heroes in blood, while we scarce take any notice of what 
we owe to the inventors of the arts." Rollin's Introduction to the Arts 
and Sciences of the Ancients. 

Who that consults history, only for that which is useful, would not pre- 
fer to peruse a journal of the daily manipulations of the laborers and me- 
chanics who furnished clothing, arms, culinary utensils, and food for the 
armies of old — to the most eloquent descriptions of their generals, or their 
battles 1 And as it is now with respect to accounts of such transactions 
in past ages — -so will it be in future with regard to similar ones of mo- 
dern times. Narrations of political convulsions, recitals of battles, and of 
honors conferred on statesmen and heroes, while dripping with human 
gore, will hereafter be unnoticed, or will be read with horror and disgust, 
while discoveries in science and descriptions of useful machines, 
will be all in all. 

It is pleasing to anticipate that day, which the present extensive and 
extending diffusion of knowledge is about to usher in, when despotism 

a Plutarch's Life of Marcellus. 



4 Workshops of the Ancients, [Book 1. 

shall no longer hold the great mass of our species, in a state of unnatu- 
ral ignorance, and of physical degradation, beneath that of the beasts 
which perish ; but when the mechanics of the world, the creators of its 
wealth, shall exercise that influence in society to which their labors en- 
title them. 

If we judged correctly of human character, we should admit that the 
mechanic who made the chair in which Xerxes sat, when he reviewed 
his mighty host, or witnessed the sea fight at Salamis, was a more use- 
ful member of society than that great king : — and, that the artisans 
who constructed the drinking vessels of Mardonius, and the brass man- 
gers in which his horses were fed, were really more worthy of posthu- 
mous fame, than that general, or the monarch he served : and, if it be 
more virtuous, more praiseworthy, to alleviate human suiferings than to 
cause or increase them ; then that old mechanician, who, when Marcus 
Sergius lost his hand in the Punic war, furnished him with an iron one, 
was an incomparably better man, than that or any other mere warrior : 
and so was he, who, according to Herodotus, constructed an artificial foot 
for Hegisostratus. a 

Notwithstanding the opinion of Plato — we believe a description of the 
workshops of Daedalus, and of Talus his nephew; those of Theodo- 
rus of Samos and of Glaucus of Chios, (the alleged inventor of the in- 
laying of metals ;) an account of the process of making the famous Lesbian 
and Dodonean cauldrons, b and of the method by which those celebrated 
paintings in glass, were executed, fragments of which have come down 
to us, and which have puzzled, and still continue to puzzle, both our ar- 
tists and our chemists ; (the figures in which, of the most minute and ex- 
quisite finish, pass entirely and uniformly through the glass ;) c if to these 
were added, the particulars of a working jeweller's shop of Persepolis 
and of Troy; of a lapidary's and an engraver's of Memphis; of a cut- 
ler's and upholsterer's of Damascus ; and of a cabinet maker's and bra- 
zier's of Rome ; together with those of a Sidonian or Athenian ship yard 
— such a record would have been more truly useful, and more really in- 
teresting, than almost all that ancient philosophers ever wrote, or poets 
ever sung. 

A description of the foundries and forges of India and of Egypt ; 
of Babylon and Byzantium ; of Sidon, and Carthage and Tyre ; would 
have imparted to us a more accurate and extensive knowledge of the 
ancients, of their manners and customs, their intelligence and progress in 
science, than all the works of their historians extant; and would have 
been of infinitely greater service to mankind. 

Had a narrative been preserved, of all the circumstances which led to 
the invention and early applications of the lever, the screw, the wedge, 
pulley, wheel and axle, &c. ; and of those which contributed to the 
discovery and working of the metals, the use and management of fire, 
agriculture, spinning of thread, matting of felt, weaving of cloth, &c. it 
would have been the most perfect history of our species — the most valua- 
ble of earthly legacies. Though such a work might have been deemed of 
trifling import by philosophers of old, with what intense interest would 
it have been perused by scientific men in modern times ! and what 
pure delight its examination would have imparted to every inquisitive and 
intelligent mind ! 

Such a record, would not only have filled the mighty chasm in the early 
history of -he world, but would have had an important influence in pro- 

» Herod. \x, 37. «» Eneid, ill.. 595, and v, 350. Herod, iv, 61. e Ed. Encyc. Art. Glass. 



Chap. 1.] And their Tools. 5 

moting the best interests of our race. It would have embraced incidents 
respecting man's early wants, and his rude efforts to supply them ; par- 
ticulars respecting eminent individuals, and the origin of antediluvian dis- 
coveries and inventions, &c. of such thrilling interest, as no modern no- 
velist could equal, nor the most fertile imagination surpass. 

It would have included a detail of those eventful experiments in which 
iron was first cast into cauldrons, forged into hatchets, and drawn into 
wire; with an account of the individuals, by whose ingenuity and perse- 
verance, these invaluable operations, were, for the first time on this pla- 
net, successfully performed. Finally, it would have convinced us, that 
these men were the true heroes of old, the genuine benefactors of their 
species, whose labors were for the benefit of all ages, and all people ; and 
an account of whose lives (not those of robbers,) should have occupied the 
pages of history, and whose names should have been embalmed in ever- 
lasting remembrance. 

A chronological account of a few meclianical implements, would have af- 
forded a clearer insight into the state of society in remote times, than any wri- 
tings now subsisting. Nay, if we could realize a complete history of a single 
tool, as a hammer, a saw, a chisel, a hatchet, an auger, or a loom, it would form 
a more comprehensive history of the world, than has ever been, or perhaps 
ever will be written. Take for example a hammer; what a multitude of in- 
teresting circumstances are inseparably connected with its development 
and early uses ! circumstances, which, if we were in possession of, would 
explain almost all that is dark and mysterious respecting our ancient pro- 
genitors. A history of this implement would embrace the origin and ge- 
neral progress of all the useful arts ; and would elucidate the civil and 
scientific acquirements of man, in every age. It would open to our 
view, the public and private economy of the ancients ; introduce us into 
the interior of their workshops, their dwellings and their temples ; it 
would illustrate their manners, politics, religion, superstition, &c. In tra- 
cing the various purposes to which it was applied, we should become ac- 
quainted with all the material transactions in the lives of some ancient in- 
dividuals from their birth to their death ; and also, with the circumstances 
which led to the rise and fall of empires. Like the celebrated " History 
of a Guinea," it would open to our inspection all the minutiee in private 
and public life. 

How infinitely various, are the materials, sizes, forms, and uses of the 
hammer % and how indicative are they all of the state of society and man- 
mers 1 At first, a club ; then a rude mallet of wood ; next, the head form- 
ed of stone, and bound to the handle by withes, or by the sinews of ani- 
mals ; afterward, the heads formed of metal. These, before iron or steel 
"was known, were often of copper and even of gold; and subsequently, 
those of the latter material were faced, like some ancient chisels, with the 
more scarce and expensive iron. a 

Ancient hammers varied as now in size, from the huge sledge of the 
Cyclops, to the portable one, with which Vulcan chased the more delicate 
work on the shield of Achilles, — from the maul, by which masses of ore 
were separated from their beds in the mines, to the diminutive ones, which 
Myrmecides of Miletus, and Theodoras of Samos, used to fabricate car- 
riages and horses of metal, which were so minute as to be covered by the 

a "It appears that in the tangible remains of smelting furnaces, found in Siberia, that 
gold hammers, knives, chisels, &c. have been discovered, the edges of ichich were skil- 
fully tipped with iron ; showing the scarcity of the ore, the difficulty of manufacturing 
it, and the plentv and apparently trifling" value of the other.*' Scientific Tracts, Bos- 
ton, 1833. Vol.'iii, 411. 



6 The Hammer. [Book I 

wings of a fly. Its, figure has always varied with its uses, and none but 
modern workers in the metals can realize the endless variety of its shapes, 
which the ancient smiths required, to fabricate the wonderfully diversified 
articles of their manuafcture : from the massive brazen altars and chariots, 
to the chased goblets, and invaluable tripods or vases, for the possession 
of which, whole cities contended. 

The history of the hammer in its widest range, would let us into the 
secrets of the statuaries and stone cutters of old : we should learn the pro- 
cess of making those metallic compounds, and working them into tools, 
with which the Egyptian mechanics sculptured those indurate columns 
that resist the best tempered steel of modern days. It would introduce us 
to the ancient chariot makers, cutlers and armorers; and would teach us 
how to make and temper the blades of Damascus ; as well as those which 
were forged in the extensive manufactory of the father of Demosthenes. 
It would make us familiar with the arts of the ancient carpenters, coiners, 
coopers and jewellers. We should learn from it, the process of forging 
dies and striking money in the temple of Juno Moneta ; of making the bod- 
kins and pins for the head dresses of Greek and Roman ladies ; while at 
the religious festivals, we should behold other forms of this implement 
in use, to knock down victims for sacrifice by the altars. 

Finally, a perfect history of the hammer, would not only have made us 
acquainted with the origin and progress of the useful arts, among the pri 
meval inhabitants of this hemisphere ; but would have solved the great 
problems respecting their connection with, and migration from the eastern 
world. 

But although we justly deplore the want of information relating to the arts 
in general of the remote ancients ; it is probable that few of their devices for 
raising water have been wholly lost. If there was one art of more importance 
than another to the early inhabitants of Central Asia and the valley of the 
Nile, it was that of raising water for agricultural purposes. Not merely their 
general welfare, but their very existence depended upon the artificial irriga- 
tion of the land ; hence their ingenuity was early directed to the construction 
olmachines for this purpose ; and they were stimulated in devising them, by 
the most powerful of all inducements. That machines must have been indis- 
pensable in past, as in present times, is evident from the climates and phy- 
sical constitution of those countries. Their importance therefore, and uni- 
versal use, have been the means of their preservation. Nor is it probable 
that any of them were ever lost in the numerous political convulsions of 
old. These seldom affected the pursuits of agriculture, and never changed 
the long established modes of cultivation ; besides, hydraulic apparatus, 
from their utility, were as necessary to the conquerors as the conquered.* 

Perhaps in no department of the useful arts, has less change taken place 
than in Asiatic and Egyptian agriculture. It is the same now, that it was 
thousands of years ago. The implements of husbandry, modes of irriga- 
tion, and devices for raising water are similar to those in use, when Ninus 
and Nebuchadnezzar, Sesostris, Solomon, and Cyrus flourished. And it 
would appear that the same uniformity in these machines prevailed over all 
the east, in ancient as in modern times : a fact accounted for, by the great 
and constant intercourse between continental and neighboring nations ; the 
practice of warriors, of transporting the inhabitants and especially the me- 
chanics and works of art, into other lands ; and also from the great impor- 
tance and universal use of artificial irrigation. 

a BattJes were sometimes fought in one field, while laborers were cultivating unmo- 
lested the land of an adjoining one. 



Chap. 1.] Hydraulic machines of the Ancients not lost. 7 

Every part of the eastern world has often had its inhabitants torn from 
, it bv war, and their places occupied by others. This practice of conque 
rors was sometimes modified, as respected the peasantry of a subdued 
country, but it appears that from very remote ages, mechanics were inva- 
riably carried off. The Phenicians, in a war with the Jews, deprived them 
of every man who could forge iron. a " There was no smith found through- 
out all the land of Israel; for the Philistines said, lest the Hebrews make 
swords and spears." Shalmanezer, when he took Samaria, carried the 
people "away out of their own land to Assyria, and the king of Assyria, 
brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from 
Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, instead of the children of Israel ; and they 
possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof." b When Nebuchad- 
nezzar took Jerusalem, he carried off, with the treasure of the temple, " all 
the craftsmen and smiths." Jeremiah says he carried away the "carpen- 
ters and smiths, and brought them to Babylon." Diodorus says, the pa- 
laces of Persepolis and Susa were built by mechanics that Cambyses car- 
ried from Egypt. c Ancient history is full of similar examples. Alexan- 
der practised it to a great extent. After his death, there was found among 
his tablets, a resolution to build several cities, some in Europe and some in 
Asia; and his design was to people those in Asia with Europeans, and 
those in Europe with Asiatics/ 1 In this manner some of the most useful 
arts, necessarily became common to all the nations of old; and their per- 
petuity in some degrree secured, especially such as related to the tillage 
and irrigation of the soil. 

We are inclined to believe that the hydraulic machines of the Assy- 
rians, Babylonians, Persians and Egyptians, have all, or nearly all, come 
down to us. Most of them have been continued in uninterrupted use in 
those countries to the present times ; while others have reached us through 
the Greeks and Romans, Saracens and Moors; or, have been obtained 
in modern days from China and Hindostan. 

It is remarkable that almost all machines for raising water, originated 
with the older nations of the world ; neither the Greeks, (if the screw of 
Conon be excepted, and even it was invented in Egypt,) nor the Romans, 
added a single one to the ancient stock ; nor is this surprising; for with 
few exceptions, those in use at the present day, are either identical with, 
or but modifications of those of the ancients. 

It is alleged that Archytas of Tarentum, 400, B. C. invented "hydrau- 
lic machines," but no account of them has reached our times, nor do we 
know that they were designed to raise water. They consisted probably, 
in the application of the windlass or crane, (the latter it is said he invent 
ed) to move machines for this purpose. Had any important or useful ma 
chine for raising water, been devised by him, it would have been continued 
in use; and would certainly have been noticed by Vitruvius, who was ac- 
quainted with his inventions, and who mentions him several times in his 
work. 1 b. chap. 1., and 9 b. chap. 3.® 

We have arranged the machines described in this work in five classes; 
to each of which, a separate book is devoted. A few chapters of the 
first book, are occupied with remarks on water; on the origin of ves- 



a l Sam. chap, xiii, 19, 22. b 2 Kings chap, xvii, 23, 24. c Goguet, Tom. iii, 13. 

d Diodorus Siculus, quoted by Robertson. India page 191. See Wilkinson's Ancient 
Egyptians, 1 vol. 206. 

e Archytas made an automaton pigeon of wood which would fly. It was this probably, 
which gave the idea to the modern mechanician of Nuremburgh, who constructed an 
eagle, which flew towards Charles V. on his entrance into that city 



8 Division of the Subject. [Book L 

SELS for containing it; on wells and fountains, and customs connected 
with them, &c. 

Some persons are apt to suppose the term hydraulic machines, compri 
ses every device for raising water; but such is not the fact. Apparatus 
propelled by it, as tide mills, &c. are hydraulic machines; these do not 
raise the liquid at all; while on the contrary, all those for elevating it, 
which are comprised in the second class, are pneumatic or hydro-pneumatic 
machines, their action depending on the pressure and elasticity of the at- 
mosphere. 

The first Class includes those, by which the liquid is elevated in movable 
vessels, by mechanical force applied to the latter. 

Water raised in a bucket, suspended to a cord, and elevated by the hand, 
or by a windlass ; the common pole and bucket, used daily in our rain wa- 
ter cisterns ; the sweep or lever so common among our farmers, are exam- 
ples of this class; so are the various wheels, as the tympanum, noria, 
chain of pots ; and also the chain pump, and its modifications. This Class 
embraces all the principal machines used in the ancient world; and the 
greater part of modern hydraulic machinery is derived from it. 

The second Class comprises such as raise water through tubes, by means 
of the elasticity and pressure, or weight of the atmosphere; as sucking 
pumps, so named; siphons, syringes, &c. 

The aplication of these machines, unlike those of the first class is limi- 
ted, because the atmosphere is only sufficient to support a column of water 
of from thirty to thirty five feet in perpendicular height; and in elevated 
countries, (as Mexico) much less. Numerous modifications of these ma- 
chines have been made in modern times, but the pump itself is of ancient 
origin. 

Those which act by compression are described in the third Class. The 
liquid being first admitted into a close vessel, is then forcibly expelled 
through an aperture made for the purpose. In some machines this is effect- 
ed by a solid body impinging on the surface of the liquid; as the piston 
of a pump : in others, the weight of a column of water, is used to accom- 
plish the same purpose. 

Syringes, fire engines, pumps which are constructed on the same princi- 
ple as the common bellows, are examples of the former; and the famous 
machine at Chemnitz in Hungary, Heron'sfountain, pressure engines, of 
the latter. Nor can the original invention of these be claimed by the mod- 
erns. Like the preceding, they were first developed by the energy of an- 
cient intellects. 

Fourth Class. There is however another class, which embraces several 
machines, which are supposed to be exclusively of modern origin ; 
and some of them are by far the most interesting and philosophical of all. 
Such as the Belier hydraulique, or ram of Montgolfier ; the centrifugal 
pump; the fire engine, so named because it raised water "by the help of 
fire;" that is, the original steam engine, or machine of Worcester, More- 
land, Savaiy and Papin. 

In the fifth Class, we have noticed such modern devices, as are either 
practically useful, or interesting from their novelty, or the principles upon 
which they act. An account of siphons is comprised in this class. Re- 
marks on natural modes of raising water. Observations on cocks, pipes, 
valves, &c; and some general reflections are added. 



Chap. 2.] Water. 



CHAPTER II. 

Water — Its importance in the economy of nature — Forms part of all substances — Food of all ani- 
mals — Great physical changes effected by it — Earliest source of inanimate motive power — Its distribu- 
tion over the earth not uniform — Sufferings of the orientals from want of water — A knowledge of this 
necessary to understand their writers — Political ingenuity of Mahomet — Water a prominent feature in 
the paradise of the Asiatics — Camels often slain by travellers, to obtain water from their stomachs- 
Cost of a draught of such water — Hydraulic machine referred to in Ecclesiastes — The useful arts origi- 
nated in Asia — Primitive modes of procuring water — Using the hand as a cup — Traditions respecting 
Adam — Scythian tradition — Palladium — Observations on the primitive state of man and the origin of 
the arts. 

"Water is, in many respects, the most important substance known to man : 
it is more extensively diffused throughout nature than almost any other. It 
covers the greater part of the earth's surface, and is found to pervade its 
interior wherever excavations are made. It enters into every or nearly 
every combination of matter, and was supposed by some ancient philoso- 
phers, to be the origin of all matter ; the primordial element ; of which 
every object in nature was formed. The mineral kingdom, with its varie- 
gated substances and chrystalizations ; the infinitely diversified and enchan- 
ting productions of the vegetable world; and every living being in anima- 
ted nature, were supposed to be so many modifications of this aqueous fluid. 
According to Vitruvits, the Egyptian priests taught, that " all things con- 
sist of water;"* and Egypt was doubtless the source whence Thales and 
others derived the doctrine. Pliny, says " this one element seemeth to 
rule and command all the rest." b And it was remarked by Pindar — 
"Of all things, water is the best." 

Modern science has shown that it is not a simple substance, but is com- 
posed of at least two others ; neither of which, it is possible, is elementary. 

Water not only forms part of the bodies of all animals, but it constitutes 
the greatest portion of their food. Every comfort of civilized or savage life 
depends more or less upon it; and life itself cannot be sustained without it. 
If there were no rains or fertilizing dews, vegetation would cease, and every 
animated being would perish. Even terrestrial animals may be considered as 
existing in water, for the atmosphere in which we live and move, is an im- 
mense aerial reservoir of it, and one more capacious than all the seas on 
the face of the earth. 

Water is also the prominent agent, by which those great physical and 
chemical changes are effected, which the earth is continually undergoing; 
and the stupendous effects produced by it, through the long series of past 
ages, have given rise, in modern times, to some of the most interesting 
departments of physical science. 

The mechanical effects produced by it, render it of the highest impor- 
tance in the arts. It was the earliest source of inanimate motive power; 
and has contributed more than all other agents to the amelioration of man's 
condition. By its inertia in a running stream, and by its gravity in a falling 
one, it has superseded much human toil; and has administered to our 
wants, our pleasures and our profits ; and by its expansion into the aeriform 



a Proem to b. viii. b Nat. Hist, xxxi, 1. 

c A human corpse which weighed an hundred and sixty pounds — when the moisture 
was evaporated, weighed but twelve. 



10 Religious Opinions respecting Water. [Book I. 

state, it appears to be destined, (through the steam engine) to accomplish 
the greatest moral and physical changes, which the intellectual inhabitants 
of this planet have ever experienced, since our species became its denizens. 

The distribution of water is not uniform over the earth's surface, nor yet 
under its crust. While in some countries, natural fountains, capacious rivers, 
and frequent rains, present abundant sources for all the purposes of human 
life ; in others, it is extremely scarce, and procured only with difficulty, and 
constant labor. This has ever been the case in various parts of Asia, and 
also in Egypt and other parts of Africa, where rain seldom falls. It is 
only from a knowledge of this fact and of the temperature and debilitating 
influences of eastern climates, that we are enabled to appreciate the pecu- 
liar force and beauty of numerous allusions to water, which pervade all 
the writings of eastern authors, both sacred and profane. Nor without 
this knowledge could we understand many of the peculiar customs of the 
people of the east. 

Mahomet well knew that his followers, living under the scorching 
rays of the sun, their flesh shrivelled with the desiccating influences of 
the air, and " dried up with thirst," could only be moved to embrace his 
doctrines by such promises as he made them, of " springs of living waters," 
"security in shades," " amidst gardens" and " fountains pouring forth plen- 
ty of water." a Nor could his ingenuity have devised a more appropriate 
punishment, than that with which he threatened unbelieving Arabs in hell. 
They were to have no mitigation of their torments; no cessation of them, 
except at certain intervals, when they were to take copious draughts of 
"filthy and boiling water." b It was universally believed by the ancients, 
that the manes of their deceased friends experienced a suspension of 
punishment in the infernal regions, while partaking of the provisions which 
their relatives placed on their graves. The Arabian legislator improved 
upon the tradition. 

The orientals have always considered water, either figuratively or lite- 
rally, as one of the principal enjoyments of a future state. Gardens, 
shades, and fountains, are the prominent objects in their paradise. In the 
Revelations we are told " the Lamb shall lead them, (the righteous,) un- 
to living fountains of waters." Chap, vii, 17. — " A pure river of water of 
life." Chap, xxii, 1. The book which contains an account of the religion 
and philosophy of the Hindoos, is named anbertkend, signifying, " the 
cistern of the waters of life." c 

Inhabitants of temperate climates, seldom or never experience that ex- 
cruciating thirst implied in such expressions as " the soul panting for wa- 
ter;" nor that extremity of despair when, under such suffering, the exhaus- 
ted traveller arrives at a place " where no water is." Under these cir- 
cumstances, the orientals have often been compelled to slay their camels, 
for the sake of the water they might find in their stomachs ; and a sum 
exceeding five hundred dollars, has been given for a single draught of it. 

It is necessary to experience something like this, in order fully to com- 
prehend the importance of the Savior's precept, respecting the giving " a 
cup of cold water," and to know the real value of such a gift. "We should 
then see that sources of this liquid are to the orientals, literally "fountains 
of life" and " wells of salvation." And when we become acquainted with 
their methods of raising water, we shall perceive how singularly apposite 
are those illustrations, which the author of Ecclesiastes has drawn from "the 
pitcher broken at the fountain;" and from "the wheel broken at the cis- 
tern." Chap, xii, 6. 

Male's Koran, chaps. 55, 76, 83. b Koran, chaps. 14, 22, 37. c Million of Facts, p. 253. 



Chap. 2.] Primitive Modes of Quenching Thirst. 11 

In attempting to discover the origin, and to trace the progress of the art 
of raising water, we must have recourse to Asia, the birthplace of the arts 
and sciences ; from whence, as from a centre, they have become extended 
to the circumference of the earth. It was there the original families of 
our race dwelt, and the inventive faculties of man were first developed. It 
was from the ancient inhabitants of that continent that much of the know- 
ledge, nearly all the arts, and not a few of the machines which we possess 
at this day, were derived. 

That man at the first imitated the lower animals in quenching his thirst at 
the running stream, there can be no doubt. It was natural, and because it 
was so, his descendants have always been found, when under similar cir- 
cumstances, to follow his example. The inhabitants of New Holland, and 
other savages quench their thirst in this manner, (i. e. by laying down.) 
The Indians of California were observed by Shelvock in 1719, to pursue 
the same method. " When they want to drink they go to the river. " a 

The heathen deities, who in general were distinguished men and wo- 
men, that were idolized after death, are represented as practising this and 
similar primeval customs. Thus Ovid describes Latoxa on a journey, and 
languishing with thirst, she arrives at a brook, 

And kneeling on the brink 

Stooped at the fresh repast, prepared to drink, 

But was hindered by the rabble race. Metam. vi, 500. 

"When circumstances rendered it difficult to reach the liquid with the 
mouth, then " the hollow of the Iiand " was used to transfer it. 

Gideon's soldiers pursued both modes in allaying their thirst ; b and it 
was the practice of the last, which Diogenes witnessed in a boy at Athens, 
which induced that philosopher to throw away his jug, as an implement no 
longer necessary. 

Virgil represents Eneas practising it : 

Then water in his hollow palm he took 
From Tyber's flood. En. viii, 95. Dryden. 

And Turnus, in the absence of a suitable vessel, made libations in the 
same way. The practice was common. 

As by the brook he stood. 

He scooped the water from the chrystal flood : 
Then with his hands the drops to heaven he throws, 
And loads the powers above with offered vows. 

" At sunrise, the Bramins take water out of a tank with the hollow of their 
hands, which they throw sometimes behind and sometimes before them, in- 
voking Brama." c 

Herodotus, describing the Nasamones, an ancient people of northern 
Africa, observes, " when they pledge their word, they drink alternately 
from each other's hands ;" (b. iv, 172.) a custom still retained among their 
descendants. It is, according to Dr. Shaw, " the only ceremony that is 
used by the Algerines in then marriages." (Travels, p. 303.) 

A Hindoo, says Mr. Ward, " drinks out of a brass cup or takes up li- 
quids in the balls of his hands." (View of the Hindoos, p. 130.) This mode 
of drinking may appear to us constrained and awkward ; but in warm cli- 
mates, the flexibility of the human body, and custom, make the performance 
of it easy and not ungraceful. 

" I drank repeatedly as I walked along, wherever the pebbles at the 
bottom gleamed clearest — just deep enough to use one's hand as a cup." 

a Voyages round the World, ii, 231. Lon. 1774 b Judges, vii, 5, 6. 

c Sonnerat, Voyage to the East Indies and China, i. 161. Calcutta, 1789. 



12 Traditions of Man, [Book I. 

(Lord Lindsay's Travels, letter 7, Arabia.) Another English traveller no- 
ticed women in India use " their hands as ladles to fill their pitchers." 

Some writers suppose that Adam, at the beginning of his existence, was 
not subject to such inconvenient modes of supplying his natural wants. 
They will have it, that he possessed the knowledge of a philosopher, and 
was equally expert as a modern mechanic, in applying it to the practical 
purposes of life. It need scarcely be remarked, that this is imaginary : we 
might as well credit the visionary tales of the rabbis, or digest the equally 
authentic accounts of Mahomedan writers. According to these, Adam must 
have been a blacksmith, for he brought down from paradise with him, five 
things made of iron ; an anvil, a fair of tongs, two hammers, a large and a 
small one, and a needle! Analogous to this is the affirmation of the Scyth- 
ians, mentioned by Herodotus, a that there fell from heaven into the Scythian 
district, four things made of gold; a plough, a yoke, an axe, and a goblet. 
The palladium of Troy, it was said, also, fell down from heaven. It was 
a small statue of Pallas, holding a distaff and spindled 

We believe there is no authority in the bible, either for the superiority 
of Adam's knowledge, or of the circumstances in which he was placed : 
on the contrary, Moses represents him and his immediate descendants, in 
that rude state, in which all the original and distinct tribes of men have been 
found at one time or another ; living on the spontaneous productions of the 
earth, on fruits and roots ; ignorant of the existence and use of the metals, (and 
there could be no civilization where these were unknown;) naked and in- 
sensible of the advantages of clothing: in process of time, using a slight co- 
vering of leaves, or other vegetable productions, and subsequently applying 
the skins of animals to the same purpose; then constructing huts or dwellings 
of the leaves and branches of trees; attaining the knowledge of, and use of 
fire ; and making slight attempts to cultivate the earth; for slight indeed they 
must have been, in the infancy of the human race, before animal power 
was applied to agricultural labor, or the implements of husbandry were 
known. Of these last, rude implements formed of sticks, might have been, 
and probably were used, as they have been by rude people in all ages. 
Virgil's description of the aborigines of Italy, previous to the reign of 
Saturn, is merely a poetic version of traditions of man in primeval times: 

Nor laws they knew, nor manners, nor the care 
Of lab'ring oxen, nor the shining share, (the plough.) 
Nor arts of gain, nor what they gained to spare. 
Their exercise the chase : the running flood 
Supplied their thirst : the trees supplied their food. 
Then Saturn came. En. viii, 420. 

Vitruvius says, " In ancient times, men, like wild beasts, lived in forests, 
caves, and groves, feeding on wild food ; and that they acquired the art of 
producing fire, from observing it evolved from the branches of trees, when 
violently rubbed against each other, during tempestuous winds." c 

Similar traditions of their ancestors were preserved by all the ancient 
nations, and some of their religious ceremonies were based upon them. 
Thus at the Plynteria, a festival of the Greeks in honor of Minerva, it was 
customary to carry in the procession a cluster of figs, which intimated the 
progress of civilization among the first inhabitants of the earth, as figs served 
them for food, after they had acquired a disrelish for acorns. The Arca- 
dians eat apples till the Lacedemonians warred with them. d 

The oak was revered because it afforded man in the first ages, both food 
3md drink, by its acorns and honey, (bees frequently making their hives 

a iv, 5. b These and similar traditions of other people, indicate the extreme antiquity 
»f the implements named. The ancients were as ignorant of their origin as we are. 
c ii, 1. d Plutarch in Alcibiades and Coriolanus. 



Chap. 2.] In Primeval Times. 13 

upon it,) and from this circumstance probably, was it made " sacred to Jupi- 
ter." The elder Pliny, in the proem to his 16th book, speaks of trees 
which bear mast, which says he, " ministered the first food unto our fore- 
fathers." Thus Ovid in his description of the golden age: — 

The teeming earth, yet guiltless of the plough, 

And unprovoked, did fruitful stores allow : 

Content with food which nature freely bred, 

On wildings and on strawberries they fed ; 

Cornels and bramble-berries gave the rest, 

And falling acorns furnished out the feast. Metam. ii, 135. 

In the ancient histories of the Chinese, it is recorded of their remote an- 
cestors, that they were entirely naked and lived in caves ; their food wild 
herbs and fruits, and the raw flesh of animals ; until the art of obtaining 
fire by the rubbing of two sticks together was discovered, and husbandry 
introduced. 

There are persons however, who suppose it dishonoring the Creator, to 
imagine that Adam, the immediate work of his hands, and the intellectual 
and moral head of the human family, should at any period of his existence 
have been destitute of many of those resources which the Indians of our 
continent, and other savages possess ; although it is evident, that some 
time must have elapsed before he could realize, (if he ever did,) all the 
conveniences which even they enjoy. 

There is nothing unreasonable or unscriptural in supposing that all the 
primitive arts originated in man's immediate wants. Indeed, they could 
not have been introduced in any other way, for it is preposterous to sup- 
pose the Creator would directly reveal an art to man, the utility of which 
he could not perceive, and the exercise of which his wants did not require. 

Nor could any art have been preserved in the early ages, except it fur- 
nished conveniences which could not otherwise be procured. On no 
other consideration could the early inhabitants of the world have been in- 
duced to practice it. But when success attended the exercise of their in- 
genuity in devising means to supply their natural and artificial wants, the 
simple arts would be gradually introduced, and their progress and perpe- 
tuity secured by practice and by that alone. 

This appeal's to have been the opinion of the ancients: 

Jove willed that man, by long experience taught, 

Should various arts invent by gradual thought. Geor. i, 150. 



1* Original Water Vessels ["Book 1 



CHAPTER III. 

Origin of Vessels for containing water— The Calabash the first one — It has always been used — 
Found by Columbus in the cabins of Americans — Inhabitants of New Zealand, Java, Sumatra, and of 
the Pacific Islands employ it — Principal vessel of the Africans — Curious remark of Pliny respecting it 
—Common among the ancient Mexicans, Romans and Egyptians — Offered by the latter people on their 
tltars — The model after which vessels of capacity were originally formed — Its figure still preserved in 
several — Ancient American vessels copied from it — Peruvian bottles— Gurgulets— The form of the Cala- 
bash prevailed in the vases and goblets of the ancients — Extract from Persius' Satires — Ancient vessels 
for heating water modeled after it— Pipkin— -Sauce-pan — Anecdote of a Roman Dictator — The com- 
mon cast iron cauldron, of great antiquity ; similar in shape to those used in Egypt, in the time of Ra- 
mese* —Often referred to in the Bible and in the Iliad — Grecian, Roman, Celtic, Chinese, and Peruvian 
cauldions — Expertness of Chinese tinkers — Crcesus and the Delphic oracle — Uniformity in the figure 
of cauldrons— Cause of this— -Superiority of their form over straight sided boilers — Brazen cauldrons 
highly prized— -Water Pots of the Hindoos— Women drawing water — Anecdote of Darius and a 
young female of Sardis — Dexterity of oriental women in balancing water pots — Origin of the Canopus 
— Ingenuity and fraud of an Egyptian priest — Ecclesiastical deceptions in the middle ages. 

Water being equally necessary as more solid food, man would early be 
impelled by his appetite, to procure it in larger quantities than were re- 
quired to allay his thirst upon a single occasion ; and, also the means by 
which he might convey it with him, in his wanderings, and to his family. 
It is not improbable that this was the first of man's natural wants which 
required the exercise of his inventive faculties to supply. The luxuri- 
ance of the vegetable region, in which all agree that he was placed, fur- 
nished in abundance the means that he sought ; and which his natural sa- 
gacity would lead him, almost instinctively, to adopt. The calabash or 
gourd, was probably the first vessel used by man for collecting and con- 
taining water: and although we have no direct proof of this, there is 
evidence, (that may be deemed equally conclusive,) in the general fact — 
that man, in the infancy of the arts, has always, when under similar cir- 
cumstances, adopted the same means, to accomplish the same objects. Of 
this, proofs innumerable, might be adduced from the history of the old 
world, particularly with regard to the uses and application of natural 
productions; and when at the close of the fifteenth century, Columbus 
opened the way to a new world, having in his search after one continent dis- 
covered another (of which neither he, nor his contemporaries ever dreamt, 
and which in extent exceeded all that his visions ever portrayed;) he found 
the calabash the principal vessel in use among the inhabitants, both for 
containing and transporting water. 

The calabashes of the Indians, (says Washington Irving,) served all 
the purposes of glass and earthenware, supplying them with all sorts of do- 
mestic utensils. They are produced on stately trees, ofthesizeof elms. a The 
New Zealanders possessed no other vessel for holding liquids ; and the 
same remark is applicable at the present day to numerous savage tribes. 
Osbeck, in his Voyage to China, remarks, that the Javanese sold to Eu- 
ropean ships, among other necessaries, " bottles of gourds filled with wa- 
ter, as it is made up for their own use." b 

When Kotzebue was at Owhyhee, Tamaahmaah the king, although he 



» Irving's Colum. i, 105, and Penny Mag. for 1834, p. 416. b i, 150. 



Chap. 3 ] The Calabash. 15 

possessed elegant European table utensils, used at dinner, a gourd contain- 
ing taro-dough, into which he dipped his fingers, and conveyed it by 
them to his mouth, observing to the Russian navigator, " this is the cus- 
tom in my country and I will not depart from it." a This conduct of Ta- 
maahmaah, resembled that of Motezuma. Solis observes, that he hai 
" cups of gold and salvers of the same," but that he sometimes drank out 
of cocoas and natural shells. b 

When Kotzebue revisited the Radack Islands, " he carried to them 
seeds of gourds for valuable vessels," as well as others of which the 
fruit is eaten. c 

" There is a gourd more esteemed by the inhabitants of Johanna for 
the large shell, than for the meat. It will hold a pailful. Its figure is 
like a man's head, and therefore called a calabash. " d 

The people of Sumatra drink out of the fruit called labu, resembling 
the calabash of the West Indies : a hole being made in the side of the 
neck and another one at the top for vent. In drinking they generally 
hold the vessel at a distance above their mouths, (like the ancient Greeks 
and Romans) and catch the stream as it falls; the liquid descending to the 
stomach without the action of swallowing.* 

The Japanese have a tradition that the first man owed his being to a 
calabash S 

Capt. Harris, in his " Wild sports of Southern Africa" (chap, xvii.) in 
describing the residence of the king of Kapaue, observes, "the furniture 
consisted exclusively of calabashes of beer, ranged round the wall." And 
again in chap, xx : — " a few melons, rather deserving the name of vegeta- 
bles, were the only fruit we met with ; and these I presume are nurtured 
chiefly for the gourd, which becomes their calabash or water flagon." 

Clavigero says, " the drinking vessels of the ancient Mexicans, were 
made of a fruit similar to gourds. "S 

For such purposes, the calabash has ever been used wherever it was 
known, and will continue to be so, as long as it grows and man lives. 

The elder Pliny, in speaking of the cultivation of gourds, a species of 
which were used as food by the Romans, observes, " of late they have 
been used in baths and hot houses for pots and pitchers ;" but he adds, 
that they were used in ancient times to contain wine, " in place of rund- 
lets and barrels." From him we learn that the ancients had discovered 
the means of controlling their forms at pleasure. He says, long gourds are 
produced from seeds taken from the neck ; while those from the middle 
produce round or spherical ones, and those from the sides, bring forth such 
as are short and thicks 

Among the offerings which the Egyptians placed on their altars, was 
the gourd. An undeniable proof of its value in their estimation; for no- 
thing was ever offered by the ancients to their gods, which was not highly 
esteemed by themselves. 1 The consecration of this primeval vessel, in 
common with other objects of ancient sacrifice, doubtless originated in its 
universal use in the early ages; and most likely gave rise to the subse- 
quent practice of dedicating cups and goblets, of gold, silver, and some- 
times of precious stones. 

As the gourd or calabash was not only the first vessel used to collect 
and convey water, but one apparently designed by the Creator for these 
purposes, a figure of it is here given. 

a Voyage Discov. Lon. 1821. i, 313, and ii, 193. b Conquest Mexico, Lon. 1724. iii. S3. 
c ni, 175. d A New Account of East India and Persia, bv Dr. Fryer. Lon. 1698. 17 
c Marden's Sumat. 61. * Montanus' Japan. 275. s Hist, of xMexico. Lon. 1837. i. 438. 
h Nat. Hist, xix, 5. i Wilkinson i, 276. 



16 



Ancient Vases. 



[Book 1. 



This interesting production of nature is entitled to par- 
ticular notice, because, it is, in all probability, the original 
model of the earliest artificial vessels of capacity ; the 
pattern from which they were formed. It is impossible 
to glance at the figure without recognizing its striking re- 
semblance to our jugs, flasks, jars, demijohns, &c. In- 
deed when man first began to make vessels of clay, he 
had no other pattern to guide him in their formation but 
this, one with which he had been so long familiar, and the 
No. figure of which experience had taught him was so well 

adapted to his wants. Independent of other advantages of this form, it 
is the best to impart strength to fragile materials. 

That the long necked vases of the ancients were modeled after it, is 
obvious. Many of them differ nothing from it in form, except in the ad- 
dition of a handle and base. The oldest vessels figured in the Grande 
Description of Egypt, by the Savans of France, and in Mr. Wilkinson's 
late work on the ancient Egyptians, are fac-similes of it. The same remark 
applies to those of the Hindoos and Chinese. 





No. 2. Ancient Vases. 

The first three on the left are of earthenware from Thebes, from 
Wilkinson's second volume, p. 345, 354. " Golden ewers" of a similar 
form were used by the rich Egyptians for containing water, to wash the 
hands and feet of their guests, (page 202.) The next is Etruscan, from 
the " History of the ancient people of Italy." Florence 1832. Plate 82. 
The adjoining one is a Chinese vase, from " Designs of Chinese Build- 
ings, Furniture," &c. Lon. 1757. The last is from Egypt. Similar shaped 
vessels of the Greeks, Romans, and other people might easily be pro- 
duced. See Salt's Voyage to Abyssinia, page 408, and Grande Descrip- 
tion, E. M. Vol. 2. Plates I, I, and F, F. In the Hamilton Collection of 
Vases, examples may be found. In the splendid volume of plates to 
D'Agincourt's Storia Dell' Arte, the figure of the gourd may be seen to 
have prevailed in artificial vessels in the fourth, fifth, and up to the 
twelfth centuries. 

Numerous vessels from the tombs of the Incas, are identical in figure 
with the calabash; while others, retaining its general feature, have the 
bellied part worked into resemblances of the human face. As several 
old Peruvian bottles exhibit a peculiar and useful feature, we have inserted 
(figure 3,) a representation of one, in the possession of J. R. Chilton, M. D. 
of this city. An opening is formed in the inner side of the handle which 
communicates with the interior of the vessel, by a smaller one made 
through the side, as shown in the section. By this device air is admit- 
ted, and a person can either drink from, or pour out the contents, with- 




<1hap. 3.] Peruvian Vessels. 17 

out experiencing that disagreeable gurgling 
which accompanies the emptying of a modern 
bottle. The openings are so arranged as to 
form a very shrill whistle — by blowing into the 
mouth of the vessel, a sound is produced, 
equal to that from a boatswain's call on 
board a man of war. 

These vessels have been noticed by most 
travelers in South America. They are some- 
times found double — two being connected at 

No. 3. Peruvian Bottle. . . . , , v i ■#» 

the bottom with only one discharging orifice. 
Some are of silver. Frezier, among others, gives a figure of one resembling 
two gourds united. It " consists of two bottles joined together, each about 
six inches high, having a hole (tube) of communication at the bottom. One 
of them is open, and the other has on its orifice a little animal, like a mon- 
key, eating a cod of some sort ; under which is a hole which makes a whist- 
ling when water is poured out of the mouth of the other bottle, or when 
that within is but shaken ; because the air being pressed along the surface 
of both bottles, is forced out at that little hole in a violent manner." a 

These whistles are so constructed, as to play either when the air is 
draivn in through them, or forced out. Perhaps the water organs of the 
ancients, were originally little more than an assemblage of similar vessels. 
M. Frezier thought the smallest of these bottles were designed expressly 
to produce music ; if so, they are (we suppose) the only water instru 
ments extant. b 

The large earthen vessels used by the water carriers of Mexico, -strict- 
ly resemble the gourd. Saturday Mag. vol. vi, 128. 

The "gurgulets" of the Persians, Hindoos, and Egyptians of the present 
day, are rather larger, but of the same shape as the Florence flask, i. e. 
of the gourd. They ar. formed " of a porous earth, and are so called, 
from the sound made when water is poured out of them to be drunk, as 



» A Voyage to the South Sea, &c. in 1712, '13, '14. Lon. 1717. 274. 

b The following extract from a late newspaper affords additional information respect- 
ing these vessels in remote ages: 

"The Peruvian Pompeii. — We recently gave a description of an ancient subterranean 
city, destroyed by an earthquake, or some other sudden convulsion of nature, lately 
discovered near the port of Guarraey, in Truxillo, on the coast of Peru. The only ac- 
count of it which appears to have as yet been received in the United States, was brought 
by Capt. Ray of Nantucket, who a few weeks since returned from the South Seas in 
the ship Logan, and who, having visited the spot whilst the inhabitants of Guarmey 
were excavating the buried streets and buildings, obtained several interesting relics of 
its ancient but unknown population. The Portland Orion describes some of these, of 
which we did not find any mention in the Nantucket Inquirer from whom we derived 
our former information, and they are of a character which may possibly afford the dili- 
gent antiquary some clue to the age and origin of the people to whom they belonged. 
They are two grotesquely shaped earthen vessels, somewhat rudely yet ingeniously 
constructed, of a species of clay, colored or burnt nearly black. One of these, which 
is capable of holding about a pint, is shaped somewhat like a quail, with a spout two 
inches long, rising from the centre of the back, from which also a handle extends to 
the side. 

The other is a double vessel, connected at the centre, and also at the top, by a handle 
reaching from the spout or nozzle of one vessel to the upper part of the other — the lat- 
ter not being perforated but wrought into the likeness of a very unprepossessing hu- 
man countenance. At the back of what may be considered the head of this face, is a 
small hole, so contrived that on blowing into the mouth of the vessel a shrill note is 
produced, similar to that of a boatswain's call. From the activity with which the exca- 
vations were proceeding when Capt. Ray left the place, it may be hoped that discover* 
ies will be made which will greatly add to the antiquarian history of this continent." 

3 



18 Primitive Boilers. [Book I. 

the Indians do without touching it with their lips." a The bottles of the 
Negroes of Africa, are made of woven grass of the same shape. Earth- 
en gUrgulets for cooling liquids are made in this city. 

The gourd was not merely imitated by primitive potters and braziers, 
but when the arts were at their zenith, its figure predominated in the most 
elaborate of vases. The preceding remarks show, that the forms of many 
of our ordinary vessels of capacity, did not originate in caprice or by 
chance, but are derived from nature ; that the pattern which man has co- 
pied, was furnished him by his Maker ; and that with all his ingenuity, 
he has never been able to supersede it. Persius in his third Satire, al- 
ludes to the transition from primitive earthenware and brazen vessels to 
those which luxury had introduced in his days : 

Now gold hath banished Numa's simple vase, 

And the plain brass of Saturn's frugal days. — 

Now do we see to precious goblets turn, 

The Tuscan pitcher, and the vestal urn. Drummond, 105. 



VESSELS FOR HEATING WATER. 

Although not strictly connected with the subject, we may observe 
that the gourd is probably the original vessel for heating water, cooking, 
fyc. In these and other applications, the neck is sometimes used as a 
handle, and an opening made into the body by removing a portion of it, 
(see illustration No. 4,) its exterior being kept moistened by water while 
on the fire, as still practised by some people, while others apply a coating 
of clay to protect it from the effects of flame. 

In some parts where the calabash or gourd is not cultivated, cocoa shells 
are used in the same manner. Kotzebue found the Radack Islanders 
thus heating liquids. " On my return. I fell in with a company sitting 
round a fire and boiling something in cocoa shells. " b A primitive Su- 
matran vessel for boiling rice is the bamboo, which is still used — by the 
time the rice is dressed, the vessel is nearly destroyed by the fire. c When 
in process of time, vessels for heating water were formed wholly of clay, 
they were fashioned after the gourd. Figures of ancient saucepans both 
of metal and fictile ware, greatly resemble it, and so do some of those of 
modern times. The common earthenware pipkin is an example. 

This useful implement has come down from very remote ages, and 
apparently with slight alteration in its figure. (See figure in No. 4.) In 
some parts of Europe, its form approaches still nearer to that of the gourd. 

It is used over all the eastern 
world. Dampier observed in 
Tonquin, " women sitting in the 
streets with a pipkin, over a small 
fire full of chau," or tea, which 
they thus prepared and sold. d 
Fosbroke enumerating the house- 
hold utensils represented in 
Egyptian sculptures, remarks, 
" we meet too with vessels of 

No. 4. Gourd, Cauldron, and Pipkin. tne P^cise form of modem saUCe- 

pans." e An interesting circum- 
stance is recorded in Roman history in connection with one of these 
vessels. Marcus Curius Dentatus, who was three times Consul, was as 

a Fryer's India and Persia, p. 47. 

b Voyage Discov. ii, 109, and iii, 152, and Fryer's India, 7. 

e Marsden's Sumatra, 60. d Dampier's Voyage. Lon. 1705. ii, 31 • For. Topog. 83. 




Chap. 3.] Iron and Brasen Cauldrons. 19 

remarkable for his frugality as his patriotism. During the time that he 
.swayed the destinies of his country, the ambassadors of the Samnites vi- 
sited him at his cottage, and found him boiling vegetables in an earthen 
pot or pipkin ; they attempted to bribe him with large presents ; but he 
characteristically replied, " I prefer my earthen pots to all your vessels 
of gold and of silver." To this Juvenal alludes, when contrasting the 
frugality of former times with the luxury of his contemporaries : 

When with the herbs 1 he gathered, Ccrics stood 

And seethed his pottage o'er the flaming wood ; 

That simple mess, an old Dictator's treat, 

The highway laborer now would scorn to eat Sat. xi, 105. 

The common cast iron bellied kettle or cauldron, furnishes another 
proof of the forms of culinary vessels having undergone little or no 
change, while passing through so many ages : its shape is precisely the 
same as that of the situla or pot, sculptured on the obelisk of Heliopolis, 
(See its figure in No. 4, and Dr. Shaw's Travels, 402, 413.) Others 
with ears and feet, are delineated in the Theban sculptures. In the tomb 
of Rameses the Third, is a graphic representation of an Egyptian kitchen, 
showing the processes of slaying the animals — cutting the joints — pre- 
paring ingredients for seasoning — boiling the meat — stirring the fire — 
making and baking bread, &c. &c. The cauldrons of various sizes are 
similar in shape to ours. "Wilkinson's An. Egyp. ii, 351, 383, 385. There 
is reason to believe that boilers of this form were common to all the na- 
tions of the ancient world; that the ' pottage ' by which Jacob defrauded 
Esau of his birthright ; and the ' savoury meat,' which Rebecca cooked 
for Isaac, were prepared in them. To one of these, Job referred ; " out 
of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething pot or cauldron." xli, 20. 
And Elisha also, when he said to his servant. " Set on the great pot, and 
seethe pottage for the sons of the prophets." 2 Kings, iv, 38. It is often 
mentioned by Homer, in whose writings it forms a conspicuous object: 

And soon the flames encompassing around its ample belly. 

Iliad, xviii, 427. Cowper 

Such were the boilers of Argos, (respecting which arose the saying, " a 
cook from Elis — a cauldron from Argos — tapestry from Corinth, &c.) and 
of the Spartans, in which they prepared their famous ' black broth.' A 
figure of a Roman cauldron, in which the priests boiled their portion of 
the sacrifice, is given by Misson, in the first volume of his Travels, plate 4. 
It has a bail, three studs or feet, and is of a spherical shape resembling 
ours, but ornamented with figures round its sides. 

The same shaped boilers were common among the Gauls, who probably 
derived the knowledge of making them from the Phenicians. The art 
of tinning culinary vessels, which they are said to have invented, (Plinv, 
Nat. Hist, xxxiv, 17,) was most likely obtained from the same source. b 
The Celtiberi are said to have been expert workers of iron. Their 
" most ancient iron pot," had ears and feet, and was shaped like those of 
the Egyptians. (See its figure in ' Scottish Grael.' p. 316. The cast iron 
cauldrons of the Chinese are also examples. These are made very thin ; 
and what is singular, their mechanics have the art of soldering them when 
cracked, with portions of the same metal, by means of a blow-pipe and 
small furnace. They are the principal article of furniture in the dwell- 

* Plutarch, says they were turnips. 

b Pliny, b. xii, 1, says, the Gauls were first induced to invade Rome, by one of their 
countrymen, a smith, who had long worked in that city. He carried home, figs, raisins, 
oil and wine, which " set the teeth of his countrymen watering." Holland's Trans. 

c " During our short stay this morning in the village of Fan-koun, I had an oppor 



20 Cauldrons. [Book 1 

ings of the poor. The kettles of the Chinese says Mr. Bell, (who lodged 
one day in a cook's house near Pekin,) " are indeed very thin, and made 
of cast iron, being extremely smooth both within and without." Fuel is 
scarce and they used bellows to heat them. a These we have no reason to 
suppose have undergone any change from the remotest times, and they 
are in all probability of the same form as the celebrated cauldrons of an- 
tiquity. That those of the Scythians, the ancient Tartars and Chinese, 
were similar to those of the Greeks, is asserted by Herodotus. " As 
Scythia is barren of wood, they have the following contrivance to dress 
the flesh of the victim : having flayed the animal, they strip the flesh 
from the bones; and if they have them at hand, they throw it into certain 
pots made in Scythia, and resembling the lesbian cauldrons, though 
somewhat larger." Herod, iv, 61. 

The boilers of the ancient Mexicans and Peruvians, had the same ge- 
neral form. See plate 31 of Frezier's Voyage to the South Sea, in 1712, 
'13, '14. As these people had not the use of iron, their vessels were of 
earthenware, copper and its alloys, silver, and even of gold. In the temple 
pie at Cusco, " were boyling pots and other vessels of gold." Two enor- 
mous cauldrons were carried by the conquerors to Spain, " each sufficient 
wherein to boyle a cow." (Purchas' Pilgrimage, 1061, and 1073.) The 
negroes of Africa, made theirs of the same shape. (Generale Histoire, 
torn, v, Planche 88.) Large cauldrons were common of old ; they are 
frequently mentioned by Homer, Herodotus, &c. and in the Bible. Maho- 
met, in the 34th chapter of the Koran, speaks of large cauldrons be- 
longing to David. Some of those represented at Thebes, appear suf- 
ficiently capacious to contain the cooks that attend them. Croesus boiled 
together a tortoise and a lamb in a large brasen cauldron, which had a 
cover of the same metal ; hence the reply of the Delphic oracle, to the 
demand of his ambassadors to be informed what Croesus was at that mo- 
ment doing : 

E'en now the odors to my sense that rise 
A tortoise boiling with a lamb supplies, 
Where brass below, and brass above it lies. Herod, i, 47. 

The question naturally arises — why such uniformity in the figure of this 
utensil 1 and what has induced people in distant times and countries to 
make it resemble a portion of a hollow sphere or spheroid, instead of 
forming it with plane sides and bottom % It is clear there was some con- 
trolling reason for this — else why should the fanciful Greek and Roman 
artists, have permitted it to retain its primitive form, while all other house- 
hold implements, as lamps, vases, drinking vessels, and tripods, &c. were 
moulded by them into endless shapes- Brasen cauldrons we know were 
highly prized. They were sometimes polished, and their sides richly or- 
namented, but still their general form was the same as those of more an- 
cient people. In this respect, both Greeks and Romans left them as they 
found them. The reason is obvious. When a liquid is heated in a cy- 
lindrical or other vessel having perpendicular sides, it easily ' boils over ;' 
but when the sides incline inwards at the top, as in these cauldrons ; it 
cannot well be thrown out by ebullition alone ; for the heated waves as they 

tunity of seeing a tinker execute what I believe is unknown in Europe. He mended 
and soldered frying-pans of cast iron, that were cracked and full of holes, and restored 
them to their primitive state, so that they became as serviceable as ever. He even took 
so little pains to effect this, and succeeded so speedily, as to excite my astonishment." 
Van Braam's Journal of the Dutch embassy to China, 1794 — 5. Lon. 1798. ii, 78, and 
Chinese Repository, Canton, 1838. iv, 38. 
a Travels from Petersburgh to diverse parts of Asia. Lon 1764. i, 312. 



Chap. 3.j Cauldrons. 21 

rise are directed towards the centre, where their force is expended against 
each other. Dyers, brewers, distillers, &c. are well aware of this fact. 
The remote ancients had therefore observed the inefficiency of straight 
sided boilers, and applied a simple and beautiful remedy ; one whch was 
possibly suggested by the previous use of natural vessels, as the gourd, 
&c. This is no mean proof of their sagacity, and of the early progress of 
the arts of founding and moulding. From the extreme antiquity of these 
cauldrons, it is not improbable that their form is similar to the pattern, 
which Tubal-Cain himself used, and which he taught his pupils to imitate. 
Similar vessels are found in the workshops of Vulcan. See plate 20, 
Painting, in D'Agincourt's Storia Dell' Arte, Prato, 1827. Brasen caul- 
drons were formerly considered suitable presents for kings — rewards of 
valor — prizes in the games, &c. Of the gifts offered by Agamemnon to 
to appease the wrath of Achilles, were — 

Seven tripods, never sullied yet by fire ; 

Of gold, ten talents ; twenty cauldrons bright/' 

Iliad, ix, 150. Coioper. 

They were among the goods which Priam took to redeem the body of 

Hector. 

He also took ten talents forth of gold, 

All weighed ; two splendid tripods ; cauldrons four ; 

And after these a cup of matchless worth. lb. xxiv. 294. 

The prizes at the funeral games on the death of Patrocles, were — 

' Capacious cauldrons, tripods bright.' 

In the 17th century, they were considered suitable presents to a Persian 
Emir — " At length he came, and was presented by the caravan-Bashi 
with a piece of satin, half a piece of scarlet cloth, and two large copper 
cauldrons." Tavernier's Trav. Lon. 1678. 61. 

These unobtrusive vessels are now used without exciting a thought of 
their worth, or of the ingenuity of those to whom we are indebted for 
them ; although they have contributed infinitely more to the real comfort 
and innocent gratification of man, than all the splendid vases that were 
ever made. These have always had their admirers and historians. Vo- 
lumes embellished with costly illustrations, have been written on their 
forms, materials, ages and authors ; but no modern Hamilton, has entered 
the kitchen to record and illustrate the origin, improvement, modifications 
and various uses of the cauldron. This vessel, like a despised but ne- 
cessary attendant, has been the inseparable companion of man in his pro- 
gress from barbarism to refinement, and has administered to his necessi- 
ties at every stage : yet it has ever been disregarded, while literary cuisi- 
niers have expatiated in numerous treatises on the virtues of meats pre- 
pared in it. Endless are the essays on sauces, but the history of the more 
useful sauce-pan is yet to be written. An account of this vessel and of 
the cauldron, would place in a very novel and instructive light, the do- 
mestic manners of the world ; and an examination of the various modes 
of heating the latter, would bring to view many excellent devices for 
economizing fuel. a 

Vases used by oriental women to convey water from public wells and 
fountains for domestic purposes, are often referred to, by sacred and pro- 
fane authors. Figure No. 5, represents a female of Hindostan, bearing 



a See the ancient Peruvian furnace in Frezier's Voyage to the South Seas, by which 
three cauldrons were heated by a very small pot of lama's dung, or of the plant icho ; 
whicn were used for want of other fuel. 




22 Water Pots. [Book 1. 

one, the shape of which, closely resembles tho 
gourd with the neck removed. This is their ge- 
neral form throughout the east. The Hindoos, 
have them of copper or brass, as well as of earth- 
enware, but they are all shaped alike. This is 
not a little singular, because a deviation from a 
globular to a cylindrical form, would enable their 
mechanics to make those of metal at much less 
expense. They therefore adhere to the pri- 
mitive model, because of its superiority over 
others, or from that adhesion to ancient customs 
Jf^J which forms so prominent a feature in Asiatic 
character. In the early ages it was the univer- 
sal custom for young women to draw water. 
The daughters of princes and chief men, were 
not exempt from it. Isis and Osiris are sometimes represented with wa- 
ter vessels on their heads. There are several interesting examples in the 
Old Testament. Homer, as might be expected, frequently introduces fe- 
males thus occupied. When Nestor entertained Telemachus, he bade 

The handmaids for the feast prepare, 

The seats to range, the fragrant wood to bring, 

And limpid waters from the living spring. Odys. iii, 544. Pope. 

And again at Ithaca ; 

With duteous haste a bevy fair, 

Of twenty virgins to the spring repair : 

* ***** 

Soon from the fount, with each a brimming urn, 

(Eumasus in their train) the maids return, lb. xx, 193 and 202. 

Fountains and wells became the ordinary places of assembly for young 
people — especially, " at the time of the evening, the time that women go 
out to draw water." Gen. xxiv, 11. Several of the Patriarchs first be- 
held their future wives on these occasions ; and were doubtless as much 
captivated by their industry and benevolent dispositions in relieving the 
wants of strangers and travelers, as by their personal charms. It was 

Beside a chrystal spring — 

that Ulysses met the daughter of Antiphates. Travelers have often no- 
ticed the singular tact with which Asiatic women balance several of these 
water pots on their heads without once touching them with their hands. 
" The finest dames of the Gentoos disdained not to carry water on their 
heads, with sometimes two or three earthen pots over one another, for house- 
hold service ; the like do all the women of the Gentiles." Fryer's Trav. 
117. At one of their religious festivals, Hindoo women, "have a custom 
of dancing with several pots of water on their heads, placed one above 
another." Sonnerat, i, 150. 

A very pleasing instance of female dexterity in carrying water, is re- 
corded by Herodotus, v, 12. As Darius, king of Persia, was sitting pub- 
licly in one of the streets of Sardis, he observed a young woman of great 
elegance and beauty, bearing a vessel on her head, leading a horse by a 
bridle fastened round her arm, and at the same time spinning some thread. 
Darius viewed her as she passed, with attentive curiosity, observing that 
her employments were not those of a Persian, Lydian, nor indeed of any 
Asiatic female ; prompted by what he had seen, he sent some of his at- 
tendants to observe what she did with the horse. They accordingly fol- 
lowed her — When she came to the river, she gave the horse some water 




Chap. 3.] Canopus. 23 

and then filled her pitcher : having done this, she returned by the way 
she came, with the pitcher of water on her head, the horse fastened by a 
bridle to her arm, and as before, employed in spinning. 

Industrious labor is an ornament to every young woman — indeed nei- 
ther the symmetry of her person, nor the vigor of her mind, can be per- 
fectly developed without it. The fine forms and glowing health of the 
women of old, were chiefly owing to their temperate modes of living, 
their industrious habits, and the exercise they took in the open air. 

A circumstance recorded in the history of the Egyptians, 
accounts for the peculiar form of one of their favorite ves- 
sels, the Canopus; the annexed figure of which, is taken 
from the i History of the ancient people of Italy,' plate 27. 
It was named after one of their deities, who became fa- 
mous on account of a victory which he obtained over 
the Chaldean deity, Fire; — the story of which exhibits 
no small degree of ingenuity in a priest, and it affords a 
fair specimen of the miracles by which people were de- 
luded in remote times. The Chaldeans boasted, as they 
justly might, of the unlimited power of their god, and 
No. 6. A Canopus. they carried him about to combat with those of other 
provinces, all which he easily overcame and destroyed, 
for none of their images were able to resist the force of fire ! — At length 
a shrewd priest of Canopus, devised this artifice and challenged the Chal- 
deans to a trial. He took an earthen jar, in the bottom and sides of 
which he drilled a great number of small holes ; — these he stopt up with 
wax, and then filled the jar with water : he secured the head of an old 
image upon it, and having painted and sufficiently disguised it, brought 
it forth as the god Canopus ! In the conflict with the Chaldean Deity 
the wax was soon melted by the latter, when the water rushed out of the 
holes, and quickly extinguished the flames. Univ. Hist, i, 206. In me- 
mory of this victory, vessels resembling the figure of the god used on 
this occasion became common. Dr. Shaw gives the figure of one which 
he brought with him from Egypt. Trav. 425. See Montfaucon, torn, ii, 
liv. i, cap. 18. A figure of one throwing out water from numerous holes 
on every side is also given. Tom. ii, liv. iii. 

A somewhat similar case of superstition in the middle ages, is quoted 
by Bayle from Baronius ; being a trial of the virtue in the bones of two 
saints ; or rather a contest of priestly skill. St. Martin's relics being 
carried over all France came to Auxerre, and were deposited in the 
church of St. Germain, where they wrought several miracles. The 
priests of the latter considered him as great a saint as the former ; they 
therefore demanded one half of the receipts, " which were considerable;" 
but Martin's priests contended that it was his relics that performed all 
the miracles, and therefore all the gifts belonged to them. To prove 
this, they proposed that a sick person should be put between the shrines 
of the saints, to ascertain which performed the cure. They therefore 
laid a leper between them, and he was healed on that side which was 
next to St. Martin's bones, and not on the other ! the sick man then very 
naturally turned his other side, and was instantly healed on that also ! 
Cardinal Baronius in commenting on this result, seriously observes, that 
St. Germain was as great a saint as St. Martin, but that as the latter had 
done him the favor of a visit, he suspended the influence he had with 
God, to do his guest the greatest honor ! The custom of having patron 
saints or gods was universal among the ancient heathen ; and the same sys- 
tem was carried by half pagan christians of the dark ages to an incredible 



*4 Wells. [Book I. 

extent. Ecclesiastics peddled the country, like itinerant jugglers, with 
sacks of bones and other relics from the charnel house — the pretended 
virtues of which, they sold to the deluded multitude as in the above instance. 



CHAPTER IV. 

On Wells — Water one of the first objects of ancient husbandmen — Lot — Wells before the deluge- 
Digging them through rock subsequent to the use of metals — Art of digging them carried to great per- 
fection by the Asiatics — Modern methods of making them in loose soils derived from the East — Wells 
often the nuclei of cities — Private wells common of old — Public wells infested by Banditti — Wells nu- 
merous in Greece — Introduced there by Danaus — Facts connected with them in the mythologic ages — 
Persian ambassadors to Athens and Lacedemon thrown into wells — Phenician, Carthagenian and Roman 
wells extant — Caesar and Pompey's knowledge of making wells enabled them to conquer — City of 
Pompeii discovered by digging a well — Wells in China, Persia, Palestine, India, and Turkey — Cisterns 
of Solomon — Sufferings of travelers from thirst — Affecting account from Leo Africanus — Mr. Bruce in 
Abyssinia — Dr. Ryers in Gombroon — Hindoos praying for water — Caravan of 2000 persons and 1800 
camels perished in the African desert — Crusaders. 

As the human family multiplied, its members necessarily kept extend- 
ing themselves more and more from their first abode ; and in searching 
for suitable locations the prospect of obtaining water would necessarily ex- 
ert a controlling influence in their decisions. An example of this, in later 
times, is given by Moses in the case of Abraham and Lot. The land 
was too much crowded by their families and flocks, " so that they could 
not dwell together," and when they had concluded to separate, Lot 
selected the plain of Jordan, because "it was toell watered everywhere." 
Gen. xiii, 10. In the figurative language of the East, "Lot lifted up his 
eyes and beheld all the plain of Jordan ;" in plain English, he went and 
carefully examined it. When thus extending themselves, the early in- 
habitants of the world, would frequently meet with locations every way 
adapted to their wants with the single exception of water ; circumstances, 
which necessarily must have excited their ingenuity in devising means 
to obtain it. 

At what period of mans' history he first had recourse to wells, we 
have no account ; nor of the circumstances which led him to penetrate the 
earth, in search of water. Wells, we have no doubt, are of antediluvian 
origin, and the knowledge of them, like that of the primitive arts, has 
been preserved by uninterrupted use from the period of their first dis- 
covery. At first, they were probably nothing more than shallow cavities 
dug in moist places ; and their depth occasionally increased, in order to 
contain the surface water that might drain into them within certain inter- 
vals of time ; a mode of obtaining it still practised among barbarous peo- 
ple. The wells of Latakoo, described by Mr. Campbell, in his " Travels 
in South Africa," were of this description. They were but two feet 
deep and were emptied every morning. The people of New Holland, 
the most wretched and ignorant of our species, had similar excavations, 
at which Damjner, when on the coast in 1688, obtained a supply for his 
ships. He says, "we filled our barrels with water at wells which had been 
dug by the natives." Burney's Voy. iv, 260. "Wells are also connected 
with the superstitions of the New Zealanders ; and the Radack Islanders, 
when discovered by Kotzebue, had pits or square wells, which they had 



Chap. 4.] Public Wells. 25 

dug for water. Kotzebue's Voy. ii, 28, 66, and iii, 145, 223. The fresh 
water which Columbus found in the huts belonging to the Indians of 
'Cuba, was probably obtained from similar wells ; but which the Span- 
iards, who found none but salt water, were unable to discover. Personal 
Nar. of Colum. 67. Boston, 1827. 

These simple excavations would naturally be multiplied and their 
dimensions enlarged as far as the limited means of man, in the early ages, 
would permit, and his increasing wants require. But when the discovery 
of the metals took place, (in the seventh generation from the first pair, ac- 
cording to both Moses and Sanchoniathon,) the depth of wells would no 
longer be arrested by rocks, nor their construction limited to locations 
where these did not occur. From very ancient wells which still remain, 
it is certain, that at a time long anterior to the commencement of history, 
the knowledge of procuring water by means of them, was well under- 
stood, perhaps, equally so as at present. On this supposition only, can we 
reconcile the selection of locations for them composed wholly of rock. 
Some of the oldest wells known are dug entirely through that material, 
and to a prodigious depth. 

Man's ingenuity was, perhaps, first exercised in procuring water ; 
and it is not improbable, that the art of constructing wells was more 
rapidly carried to perfection than any other. The physical character of 
central Asia, its climate, universal deficiency of water, its swarms of in- 
habitants, and their pastoral, and agricultural pursuits, would necessarily 
contribute to this result. The Abbe Fleury, in his " Manners of the An- 
cient Israelites," justly observes, " their numerous herds of cattle necessa- 
rily induced them to set a very high value on their wells and cisterns ; and 
more especially as they occupied a country where there was no river but 
Jordan, and where rain seldom fell." Chap. iii. In no other part of the 
world, even in modern times, has more science been evinced, or mechani- 
cal skill displayed in penetrating the earth, than is exhibited in some of the 
ancient wells of the east ; and it is to their authors, that we are indebted 
for the only known method of sinking wells of great depth, through loose 
soils and quicksands, viz : by first constructing a curb, (of stone, brick, 
&c.) which settles as the excavation is deepened, and thereby resists the 
pressure of the surrounding soil. 

Wells are mentioned by Moses, as in common use among the ancient 
Canaanites; some of which at that remote age adjoined roads, for the be- 
nefit of travelers and the public at large. Indeed, all people who have had 
recourse to wells, have consecrated some of them to the convenience of 
6trangers and travelers. The first wells were probably all of this descrip- 
tion. Most of those mentioned in history were certainly such. At one of 
these, Hagar rested and refreshed herself, when she fled from the ill treat- 
ment of Sarah. And it was "by the way" of this well, that Isaac was going 
when he first met with Rebecca. And we learn from Gen. xxv, 11, that 
he subsequently took up his abode near it ; a custom by which wells 
frequently became nuclei of ancient cities. Jacob's well is an example, 
if really dug by him. When that patriarch and his family drank of its 
waters, few dwellings were near it; (Gen. xxiii, 19 ;) but, before the time 
of Alexander, these had so far increased, as with the ancient Shalem, to 
form the capital city of Samaria. And 600 years before Alexander's con- 
quest of Judea, Jeroboam when he governed the ten tribes had a palace 
in the vicinity of this well. Josephus, Antiq. viii, 3. " Tadmor in the wil- 
derness," or Palmyra, one of the most splendid cities of the old world, 
was built by Solomon (2 Chron. viii, 4,) in the Syrian desert, and its loca- 
tion determined according to Josephus, (Antiq. viii, 6,) " because at that 

4 



2G Private Wells. [Book I, 

place only there are springs and pits (wells) of water." Pliny makes the 
same remark, and speaks of its "abundance of water." Nat. His. v, 25. 
Bonnini, in his ' Syracuse Antichi,' remarks that most of the Sicilian cities 
took their names from the fountains they were near, or the rivers they 
bordered upon. The deep well in the Cumean Sybil's cave, gave its name 
Lilybe, both to the cape and town near it. Breval's Remarks on Europe, 19 
and 39. The same may be said of other European cities. Bath in Eng- 
land derived its name from the springs near it. It was named Caer-Badon, 
or the place of baths, before the Roman invasion. The city of Wells, 
also, was named after the wells of water near it, especially the one now 
known as St. Andrew's Well. Lewis's Topographical Dictionary. Many 
others might be named. 

Private wells were, however, very common in ancient times. Abraham 
and Isaac constructed several for the use of their own families and flocks. 
David's spies were secreted in the well of a private house. " Water 
out of thine own cistern and running waters out of thine own well," is 
the language of Proverbs, v, 15 ; and in the 2d Book of Kings, xviii, 31, 
we read of " every one drinking water out his of own cistern ;" or pit as it 
is in the margin ; a term often used by eastern writers, synonymously with 
well. In the plans of private houses at Karnac, it appears that the ancient 
Egyptians arranged their houses and court yards (Grande Description, 
torn, iii, Planche xvi,) in a manner very similar to those of the Romans, 
as seen at Pompeii, and like these, each house was generally furnished 
with a round well and an oblong cistern. Lardner's Arts of the Greeks 
and Romans, i, 44. " If I knew a man incurably thankless," says Seneca, 
" I would yet be so kind as to put him on his way, to let him light a can- 
dle at mine, or draw water at my well." Seneca on Benefits; L'Estrange's 
Trans. The story of Apono, an Italian philosopher, and reputed magi- 
cian, of the 13th century, indicates that almost every house had a well. 
He, however, had not one, or it was dry, and his neighbor having refused 
to let his maid draw water from his well, Apono, it was said, by his 
magic caused it through revenge to be carried off by devils. Bayle. ' 

Numerous wells of extreme antiquity are still to be seen in Egypt. 
Van Sleb notices several. Besides those in some of the pyramids, there are 
others which are probably as old as those structures. Mr. Wilkinson men- 
tions one near the pyramids of Greezer. An. Egyp. vol. iii. Among the 
ruins of Nineveh, a city whose foundations were laid by Ashur, the son 
of an antediluvian, is a remarkable well, which supplies the peasants of 
the vicinity with water, and who attribute to it many virtues.* Captain 
Rich named it Thisbe's Well. The immediate successors of that Pharaoh 
who patronized Joseph erected stations to command the wells, (which were 
previously in use, and probably had been for ages,) at TVadce Jasous, and 
these same wells still supply the port of Philoteras or JEnnum, on the Red 
Sea, with water, as they did four thousand years ago. b 

The building of stations to protect wells was common in ancient times, 
on account of robbers laying in wait near them. There is an allusion to 
this in Judges, "They are delivered from the noise of archers in the places 
of drawing water." Chap, v, 11. It was at the public fountains that the 
Pelasgi attacked the Athenian women. Near the ruins of an Egyptian 
Temple at Wady El Mecah, is an enclosure, in the centre of which is a 
well. "All round the well there is a platform or gallery raised six feet, 
on which a guard of soldiers might walk all round. In the upper part 

a Narrative of a residence in Koordistan, and on the site of ancient Nineveh, by 
C. J. Rich, Lon 1836. Vol. ii, 26 and 34. b An. Egyp. Vol i, 46. 



Chap. 4.] . Grecian Wells. 27 

of the wall are holes for discharging arrows." Fosbrokes' For. Top. 322. 
The custom of guarding the roads, especially in the vicinity of tanks and 
wells, is still common. Fryer in his Travels in India, noticed it. " We 
found them in arms, not suffering their women to stir out of the town un- 
guarded, to fetch water." Page 126, 222. In Shaw's Travels in Mauri- 
tania, he noticed a beautiful rill of water, which flowed into a basin of 
Roman workmanship, named ' Shrub ice Krub,' i. e. " drink and be off," 
on account of the danger of meeting assassins in its vicinity. Sandys 
speaks of the " wells of fear." Travels, p. 140. 

In ancient Greece, wells were very numerous. The inhabitants of 
Attica were supplied with water principally from them. Vitruvius re- 
marks, that the other water which they had, was of bad quality. B. viii, 
Chap. 3. Plutarch has preserved some of the laws of Solon respecting 
wells. By these it was enacted that all persons who . lived within four 
furlongs of a public well, had liberty to use it; but when the distance was 
greater, they were to dig one for themselves ; and they were requir- 
ed to dig at least six feet from their neighbor's ground. Life of Solon. 
According to Pliny, Danaus sunk the first wells in Greece. Nat. His. 
vii, 56. Plutarch, in his life of Cimon, says the Athenians taught the rest 
of the Greeks " to sow bread corn, to avail themselves of the use of wells, 
and of the benefit of fire " From the connection in which wells are here 
mentioned, it is evident, that in the opinion of the ancient Greeks, they 
were among the first of man's inventions ; and hence the antiquity of de- 
vices to raise water from them. In the mythologic ages, the labor of rais- 
ing water out of deep wells was imposed as a punishment on the daugh- 
ters of Danaus, for the murder of their husbands. The daughters of Phae- 
don (who was put to death by the thirty tyrants) threw themselves into a 
well, preferring death to dishonor. The body of Chrysippus, son of 
Pelops, was disposed of in the same way, after being murdered by his 
brothers, or his step-mother. When Darius sent two heralds to demand 
earth and water of the Athenians, (the giving of which was an acknow- 
ledgment of subjection,) they threw one of them into a ditch, and the 
other into a well, telling them in mockery to take what they came for. 
Plutarch. And Herodotus informs us, that the Lacedemonians treated the 
Persian ambassadors, who were sent to them on the same errand, in pre 
cisely the same manner. Herod, b. viii. 133. These brutal acts led to 
the invasion of Greece by Xerxes. 

Shortly after Alexander's death, Perdiccas and Roxana murdered Statira 
and her sisters, and had their bodies thrown into a well. Hence, wells 
were probably common in Babylon as well as in Nineveh ; for this was 
most likely a private one ; a public one would scarcely have been select- 
ed, where concealment was required. Sir R. K. Porter, in his Travels in 
Georgia, Persia, Armenia, and ancient Babylon, Vol. i. 698, speaks of the 
remains of an ancient and " amazing deep well," near Shiraz. Remains 
of Phenician and Carthagenian wells are still to be seen. Near the ancient 
Barca, Delia Cella discovered "wells of great depth, some of which still 
afford most excellent water." a At Arar, are others, some of which are 
excavated through rocks of sandstone. At Arzew, the ancient Arsenaria, 
Dr. Shaw observed a number of wells, "which from the masonry appear 
to be as old as the city." b The celebrated fountain of the sun of the an- 
cients, near the temple of Jupiter Ammon, according to Belzoni, is 
a well sixty feet deep, and eight feet square. (In this case and 

* Russel's Barbary States. b Trav. p. 29. 



28 Discovery of Herculaneum, [Book L 

numerous others, the terms "well" and "fountain," are synonymous. 
" The following is among the first observations of Sir William Gel], 
after landing on the Troad ; " we past many wells on the road, a 
proof that the country was once more populous than at present* The 
inhabitants of Ithaca, the birth place of Ulysses and Telemachus, and 
the scene of some of the principal events recorded in the poetry of 
Homer, still draw their supplies of water, as in former times, from wells. b 
And as in other places, a tower was anciently erected to guard one of 
these wells, and protect the inhabitants while drawing water from it. c 

The ancient Egyptians irrigated the borders of the desert above the 
reach of the inundations of the ~Ni\e,from wells, which they dug for that 
purpose/ 1 The Chinese also use wells to water their land. 

As it regards the antiquity and importance of wells, it has been observed 
that the earliest account on record of the purchase of land, 23 Gen. was 
subsequent to that of a well, Gen. xxi, 30. 

Roman wells are found in every country which that people conquered. 
Their armies had constant recourse to them, when other sources of water 
failed, or were cut off by their enemies. Paulus Emilius, Pompey, and Cae- 
sar, often preserved their troops from destruction by having recourse to them. 
This was strikingly illustrated by Caesar when besieged in Alexandria; the 
water in the cisterns having been spoiled by the Egyptians. It was Pom- 
pey 's superior knowledge in thus obtaining water, which enabled him to 
overthrow Mithridates, by retaining possession of an important post, 
which the latter abandoned for want of water. Thus the destinies of 
these manslayers and their armies, frequently depended on the wells 
which they made. 

The city of Rome, previous to the time of Appius Claudius Csecus, who 
first conveyed water to it by an aqueduct, A. U. C. 411, was supplied chiefly 
from fountains and wells, several of which are preserved to this day. (At 
Chartres in France, a Roman well is still known as the ' Saints' Well,' on 
account of martyrs drowned in it by the Romans.) 

In noticing the wells of ancient Italy, we may refer to a circumstance, 
which although trivial in itself, led to the most surprising discovery that 
had ever taken place on this globe, and one which in the interest it has 
excited is unexampled. In the early part of the eighteenth century, 1711, 
an Italian peasant while digging a well near his cottage, found some 
fragments of colored marble. These attracting attention, led to further ex- 
cavation, when a statue of Hercules was disinterred, and shortly after- 
wards a mutilated one of Cleopatra. These specimens of ancient art, 
were found at a considerable depth below the surface, and in a place 
which subsequently proved to be a temple situated in the centre of the 
ancient city of Herculaneum ! This city was overwhelmed with ashes 
and lava, during an eruption of Vesuvius, A. D. 79, being the same in 
which the elder Pliny perished, who was suffocated with sulphurous va- 
pors, like Lot's wife in a similar calamity. Herculaneum therefore had 
been buried 1630 years ! and while every memorial of it was lost, and 
even the site unknown, it was thus suddenly, by a resurrection then 
unparalleled in the annals of the world, brought again to light ; and 
streets, temples, houses, statues, paintings, jewellery, professional imple- 
ments, kitchen utensils, and other articles connected with ancient domestic 
life, were to be seen arranged, as when their owners were actively mov- 



Top. of Troy, Lon. 1804, p. 5. b Ed. Encyc. Art. Ithaca. 

Lard. Arts of the Greeks and Rom. V-J. i, 13G. d Wilk. Vol. i, 220. 



Chap. 4.] By Digging a Well. 29 

ing among them. Even the skeletons of some of the inhabitants were 
found ; one, near the threshold of his door, with a bag of money in his 
hand, and apparently in the act of escaping. 

The light which this important discovery reflected upon numerous sub- 
jects connected with the ancients, has greatly eclipsed all previous sour- 
ces of information ; and as regards some of the arts of the Romans, the 
information thus obtained, may be considered almost as full and satisfactory, 
as if one of their mechanics had risen from the dead and described them. 
- Among the early discoveries made in this city of Hercules, (it having 
been founded by, or in honor of him, 1250, B. C.) not the least interesting 
is one of its public wells ; which having been covered by an arch and 
surrounded by a curb, the ashes were excluded. Phil. Trans, xlvii, 
151. This well was found in a high state of preservation — it still con- 
tains excellent water, and is in the same condition as when the last fe- 
males retired from it, bearing vases of its water to their dwellings, and 
probably on the evening that preceded the calamity, which drove them 
from it for ever. 

Forty years after the discovery of Herculaneum, another city over- 
whelmed at the same time, was " destined to be the partner of its disinter- 
ment, as well as of its burial." This was Pompeii, the very name of 
which had been almost forgotten. As it lay at a greater distance from 
Vesuvius than Herculaneum, the stream of lava never reached it. It was 
inhumed by showers of ashes, pumice and stones, which formed a bed of 
variable depth from twelve to twenty feet, and which is easily removed; 
whereas the former city was entombed in ashes and lava to the depth of 
from seventy to a hundred feet. With the exception of the upper stories 
of the houses, which were either consumed by red hot stones ejected from 
the volcano, or crushed by the weight of the matter collected on their 
roofs, we behold in Pompeii a flourishing city nearly in the state in which 
it existed eighteen centuries ago ! The buildings unaltered by newer 
fashions ; the paintings undimmed by the leaden touch of time ; household 
furniture left in the confusion of use ; articles even of intrinsic value 
abandoned in the harry of escape, yet safe from the robber, or scattered 
about as they fell from the trembling hand which could not stoop or pause 
for the most valuable possessions ; and in some instances the bones of the 
inhabitants, bearing sad testimony to the suddenness and completeness of 
the calamity which overwhelmed them. Pompeii, i, 5. Lib. Entertaining 
Knowledge. In the prison, skeletons of unfortunate men were discov- 
ered, their leg bones being enclosed in shackles, and are so preserved in 
the museum at Portici. 

I noticed, says M. Simond, a striking memorial of this mighty eruption, 
m the Forum opposite to the temple of Jupiter; a new altar of white 
marble exquisitely beautiful, and apparently just out of the hands of the 
sculptor, had been erected there ; an enclosure was building all around ; 
the mortar just dashed against the side of the wall, was but half spread 
out ; you saw the long sliding stroke of the trowel about to return and 
obliterate its own track — but it never did return ; the hand of the work- 
man was suddenly arrested ; and, after the lapse of 1800 years, the whole 
looks so fresh, that you would almost swear the mason was only gone to 
his dinner, and about to come back immediately to finish his work ! 
We can scarcely conceive it possible for an event connected with the arts 
of former ages, ever to happen in future times, equal in interest to the re- 
surrection of these Roman towns, unless it be the reappearance of the 
Phenician cities of the plain. 

From the facility of removing the materials at Pompeii, much greater 



'to Wells in Asia. [Book I. 

advances have been made in uncovering the buildings and clearing the 
streets, than will probably ever be accomplished in Herculaneum. As 
might have been expected, several wells have been found, besides rain- 
water cisterns and fountains in great numbers. The latter were so com- 
mon, that scarcely a street has been found without one ; and every house 
was provided with one or more of the former. 

During the excavations immediately previous to the publication of Sir 
Wm. Gell's splendid work, ' Pompeiana,' in 1832, a very fine well was 
discovered near the gate of the Pantheon, 11G feet in depth and contain 
ing 15 feet of water ! a 

That wells were numerous in Asia and the east generally, we can 
readily believe, when we learn that some of the most fertile districts, 
could neither be cultivated nor inhabited without them. Not less than 
fifty thousand wells were counted in one district of Hindostan, when taken 
possession of by the British; several of which are of very high antiquity. 
In China, wells are numerous, and often of large dimensions, and even 
lined with marble. In Pekin they are very common, some of the deepest 
wells of the world are in this country. M. Arago, (in his Essay on Arte- 
sian Wells,) observes that the Chinese have sunk them to the enormous 
depth of eighteen hundred feet ! " Dig a well before you are thirsty," is 
one of their ancient proverbs. The scarcity of water over all Persia has 
been noticed by every traveler in that country. In general the inhabi- 
tants depend entirely on wells, the water of which is commonly bad. 
Fryer, xxxv, 67. 

To provide water for the thirsty has always been esteemed in the east, 
one of the most excellent of moral duties, hence benevolent princes and rich 
men, have, from the remotest ages, consecrated a portion of their wealth 
to the construction of wells, tanks, fountains, &c. for public use. It is re- 
corded as one of the glories of Uzziah's reign, that he ''digged many 
wells." Over all Persia, there are numerous cisterns built for public use 
by the rich. Fryer, 225. "Another work of charity among the Hindoos" 
observes Mr. Ward, "is the digging of pools, to supply the thirsty traveler 
with water. The cutting of these, and building nights of steps, in order to 
descend into them, is in many cases very expensive; 4,000 rupees, (2,000 
dollars,) are frequently expended on one." At the ceremony of setting it 
apart for public use, a Brahmin, in the name of the donor, exclaims, " I 
offer this pond of water to quench the thirst of mankind," after which the 
owner cannot appropriate it to his own use. Hist. Hindoos, 374. 

Ferose, one of the monarchs of India, in the fourteenth century, " built 
fifty sluices" (to irrigate the land,) and " one hundred and fifty wells." 
One of the objects, which the fakirs, or mendicant philosophers of India, 
have frequently in view, in collecting alms, is to ' dig a well,' and thereby 
atone for some particular sin. Other devotees stand in the roads with 
vessels of water, and give drink to thirsty travelers from the same motives. 
Among the supposed causes of Job's affliction, adduced by Eliphaz, was, 
"thou hast not given water to the weary to drink," xxii, 7: a most hor- 
rible accusation in such a country as Syria, and one which that righteous 
man denied with the awful imprecation, " then let mine arm fall from my 
shoulder blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone." xxxi, 22 

" The sun was setting," says Mr. Emerson, "as we descended the last 
chain, and with the departure of daylight, our tortures commenced, as it 
was too dark to see any of the fountains charitably erected by the Turks 
near the road." b Large legacies are sometimes left by pious Turks for the 

a Pompeiana, Preface. a Letters from the Egean, Let. 5. 



Chap. 4.] Sufferings of Travelers. 31 

erection of fountains, who believe they can do no act more acceptable to 
God. a This mode of expending their wealth, at the same time that it 
conferred real and lasting benefits on the public, was the surest way of 
transmitting to posterity the names of the donors. The pools of Solomon, 
might have preserved his name from oblivion had nothing else respecting 
him been known. These noble structures, in a land where every other work 
of art has been hurried to destruction, remain almost as perfect as when 
they were constructed, and Jerusalem is still supplied with water from 
them, by an earthen pipe about ten inches in diameter. " These reser- 
voirs are really worthy of Solomon; I had formed no conception of their 
magnificence ; they are three in number, the smallest between four, and 
five hundred feet in length." The waters are discharged from one into 
another, and conveyed from the lowest to the city. " I descended into 
the third and largest ; it is lined with plaister like the Indian chunan, and 
hanging terraces run all round it." Lindsay's Trav. Let. 9. 

According to the moral doctrines of the Chinese, "to repair a road, 
make a bridge, or dig a well," will atone for many sins. Davis' China, 
ii, 89. The Hindoos, says Sonnerat, believe the digging of tanks on the 
highways, renders the gods propitious to them ; and he adds, " Is not this 
the best manner of honoring the deity, as it contributes to the natural 
good of his creatures'?" Vol. i, 94. 



SUFFERINGS OF TRAVELERS FROM THIRST. 

The extreme sufferings which orientals have been, and are still called to 
endure from the want of water, have been noticed by all modern travelers, 
from Rubriques and Marco Paulo, to Burckhardt and Niebuhr. Wells in 
some routes, are a hundred miles apart, and are sometimes found empty ; 
hence travelers have often been obliged to slay their camels for the wa- 
ter these animals retain in their stomachs. Leo Africanus noticed two 
marble monuments in his travels ; upon one of which was an epitaph, 
recording the manner in which those who slept beneath them had met 
their doom. One was a rich merchant, the other a water carrier, who 
furnished caravans with water and provisions. On reaching this spot, 
scorched by the sun and their entrails tortured by the most excruciating 
thirst; there remained but a small quantity of water between them. The 
rich man, whose thirst now made him regard his gold as dirt, purchased a 
single cup of it for ten thousand ducats ; but that which possibly might 
have been sufficient to save the life of one of them, being divided be- 
tween both, served only to prolong their sufferings for a moment, and they 
both sunk into that sleep from which there is no waking upon earth. 
Lives of Travelers, by St. John. 

Mr. Bruce, when in Abyssinia, obtained water from the stomachs of 
camels, which his companions slew for that purpose. Sometimes the 
mouths and tongues of travelers, from want of this precious liquid, be- 
come dry and hard like those of parrots ; but these are not the only 
people who suffer from thirst. During the long continuance of a drought 
which prevailed over all Judea in Ahab's reign, every class of people 
suffered. 1 Kings, xvii and xviii. And such droughts are not uncom- 
mon. " The poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their 
tongue faileth for thirst," (Isa. xli, 17,) in modern times as when the pro- 
phet wrote, and not the poor alone, for " the honorable men are famish- 
ed," and, as well as the multitude, are "dried up with thirst." Isa. v, 13 

a Com. Porter's Letters from Constantinople, i, 10]. 



32 Crusaders. [Book I 

Mechanics in cities were not exempt. " The smith with the tongs, both 
worketh in the coals and fashioneth it with hammers, and worketh it with 
jhe strength of his arms, is hungry and his strength faileth, he drinketk no 
water and is faint." Isa. xliv, 12. 

Dr. Ryers, who lived in the city of Gombroon, on the Persian Gulf, 
when describing the heat of the climate and the deficiency and bad quality 
of the water, observes that the heat made " the mountains gape, the rocks 
cleft in sunder, the waters stagnate, to which the birds with hanging 
wings repair to quench their thirst ; for want of which the herds do low, 
the camels cry, the barren earth opens wide for olrmk ; and all things ap- 
pear calamitous for want of kindly moisture ; in lieu of which hot blasts 
of wind and showers of sand infest the purer air, and drive not only us, 
but birds and beasts to seek remote dwellings, or else to perish here ;" and 
after removing to a village some miles distant, " for the sake of water," 
by a metaphor, that will appear to some persons as bordering on blas- 
phemy, he says, " it was as welcome to our parched throats, as a drop of 
that cool liquid, to the importunate Dives." Fryer, p. 418. Under similar 
circumstances, the Hindoos, night and day run through the streets, carry- 
ing boards with earth on their heads, and loudly repeating after the Brah- 
mins, a prayer, signifying " God give us water." Even in Greece and 
Rome, where water was in comparative abundance, agricultural laborers 
considered the Frog an object of envy, inasmuch as it had always 
enough to drink in the most sultry weather. Lard. Arts Greeks and Rom. 
Vol. ii, 20. The ignorant and clamorous Israelites, enraged with thirst, 
abused Moses, and were ready to stone him, because they had no water. 

One of the most appalling facts that is recorded of suffering from thirst 
occurred in 1805. A caravan proceeding from Timboctoo to Talifet, was 
disappointed in not finding water at the usual watering places ; when, 
horrible to relate, all the persons belonging to it, two thousand in number, 
besides eighteen hundred camels, perished by thirst! Occurrences like 
this, account for the vast quantities of human and other bones, which are 
found heaped together in various parts of the desert. Wonders of the 
World, p. 246. While the crusaders besieged Jerusalem, great numbers 
perished of thirst, for the Turks had filled the wells in the vicinity. Me- 
morials of their sufferings may yet be found in the heraldic bearings of their 
descendants. The charge of a foraging party ' for water,' we are told, " was 
an office of distinction;" hence, some of the commanders on these occa- 
sions, subsequently adopted water buckets in their coats of arms, as em- 
blems of their labors in Palestine. ' Water Bougettes,' formed part of 
the arms of Sir Humphrey Bouchier, who was slain at the battle of Bar- 
net, in 1471. Moules' Ant. of Westminster Abbey. 



Chap. 5.] Worship of WeHs. 33 



CHAPTER V. 

Subject of Wells continued — Wells worshipped — River Ganges — Sacred well at Benares — O&'Jjs *• 
ken at Wells — Tradition of the Rabbins-Altars erected near them — Invoked-Ceremonies with Tisiri tt 
water in Egypt, Greece, Peru, Mexico, Rome, and Jndea — Temples erected over wells — The fountain 
of Apollo— Well Zem Zem — Prophet Joel— Temple of Isis— Mahommedan Mosques— Hindoo templ« 
— Woden's well — Wells in Chinese temples — Pliny— Celts —Gauls-— Modern superstitions with regawl 
to water and wells — Hindoos — Algerines— Nineveh — Greeks — Tombs of saints near wells— Supersti- 
tions of the Persians — Anglo Saxons— Hindoos — Scotch — English — St. Genevieve's well — St. Wini- 
fred's well — House and well ' warming.' 

In the early ages water was reverenced as the substance of which all 
things in the universe were supposed to be made, and the vivifying prin- 
ciple that animated the whole ; hence, rivers, fountains, and wells, were 
worshipped and religious feasts and ceremonies instituted in honor of 
them, or of the spirits which were believed to preside over them. Al- 
most all nations retain relics of this superstition, while in some it is practi- 
sed to a lamentable extent. Asia exhibits the humiliating spectacle of 
millions of her people degraded by it, as in former ages. Shoals of pil- 
grims are constantly in motion over all Hindoston, on their way to the 
* sacred Granges ;' their tracks stained with the blood and covered with 
the bones of thousands that perish on the road. "With these people, it is 
deemed a virtue even to think of this river ; while to bathe in its waters 
washes away all sin, and to expire on its brink, or be suffocated in it, is 
the climax of human felicity. The holy well in the city of Benares is 
visited by devotees from all parts of India ; to it they offer rice, &c. as to 
their idols. 

From this sacred character of water, it very early became a custom, in 
order to render obligations inviolable, to take oaths, conclude treaties, 
make bargains, &c. at wells. We learn that when Jacob was on his way 
to Egypt, he came to the " well of the oath," and offered sacrifices to God. 
Josephus, Ant. ii, 7. At the same well, his grandfather Abraham conclu- 
ded a treaty with Abimelech, which was accompanied with ceremonies 
and oaths. Gen. xxi. At the celebrated Puteol Libonis, at Rome, oaths 
were publicly administered every morning; a representation of this well 
is on the reverse of a medal of Libo. Encyc. Ant. 412. It was believed 
that the " oaths of the Gods" was also by water. Univer. His. Vol. iv, 
17. The Rabbins have a tradition that their kings were always anoint- 
ed by the side of a fountain. Solomon was carried by order of David to 
the 'fountain of Gihon,' and there proclaimed king. Joseph. Ant. vii, 14. 

The ancient Cuthites, says Mr. Bryant, and the Persians after them, had 
a great veneration for fountains and streams. Altars were erected in 
the vicinity of wells and fountains, and religious ceremonies performed 
around them. Thus Ulysses : 

Beside a fountain's sacred brink, we raised 

Our verdant altars, and the victims blazed. Iliad ii, 368. 

"WTierever a spring rises, or a river flows," says Seneca, "there we 
should build altars and offer sacrifices," and a thousand years before Se- 
neca lived, the author of the 68th Psalm spoke of worshipping God from 
the " fountains of Israel." The Syracusans held great festivals every 

5 



34 Religious Customs. [Book I. 

year at the fountains of Aretnusa, and they sacrificed black bulls to Pluto 
at the fountain of Cyane. Wells were sometimes dedicated to particular 
deities, as the oracular fountain mentioned by Pausanias, near the sea at 
Patra, which still remains nearly as he described it ; and having been re- 
dedicated to a christian saint, "is still a sacred well." Divination by 
water, was practised at this well. A mirror was suspended by a thread, 
having its polished surface upwards, and while floating on the water, 
presages were drawn from the images reflected. 

Polynices, in CEdipus Coloneus, swears " by our native fountains and 
our kindred gods." Antigone, when about to be sacrificed, appeals to the 
" fountains of Dirce, and the grove of Thebe." Ajax before he slew 
himself, called on the sun, the soil of Salamis, and "ye fountains and 
rivers here." Trag. of Sophocles lit. trans. 1837. 

"At Peneus' fount Aristeus stood and bowed with woe, 

Breathed his deep murmurs to the nymph below : Georgics L. iv, 365. 

Cyrene ! thou whom these fair springs revere." 

The fountain of Aponeus, (now Albano) the birth place of Livy, was 
an oracular one. That of Pirene at Corinth, was sacred to the muses. 
Eneas invoked " living fountains" among other " Ethereal Gods." And 
old Latinus 

" Sought the shades renowned for prophecy. 

Which near Albuneas' sulphureous fountain lie." En. vii, 124. 

Cicero says, the Roman priests and augurs, in their prayers, called on 
the names of rivers, brooks, and springs. 

Vessels of water were carried by the Egyptian priests in their sacred 
processions, to denote the great blessings derived from it, and that it was 
the beginning of all things. Vitruvius says they were accustomed to 
place a vase of it in their temples with great devotion, and prostrating 
themselves on the earth, returned thanks to the divine goodness for its pro- 
tection. Book viii, Proem. In the celebration of the Eleusinian myste- 
ries, those who entered the temple, washed their hands in holy water, and 
on the ninth and last day of the festival, vessels of water were offered 
with great ceremonies, and accompanied with mystical expressions to the 
Gods. Those who were initiated were prohibited from ever sitting on 
the cover of a well. Sojourners among the Greeks carried in the religious 
processions, small vessels formed in the shape of boats ; and their daugh- 
ters ivater pots with umbrellas. Rob. Ant. Greece. Plutarch says, 
"Jishes were not eaten of old, from reverence of springs." 

Among the ancient Peruvians, certain Indians were appointed to sacri- 
fice "to fountains, springs, and rivers." Pur. Pil. 1076. Holy water was 
placed near the altars of the Mexicans. Ibid, 987. Tlaloc was their God 
of water; on fulfilling particular vows they bathed in the sacred pond 
Tezcapan. The water of the fountain Toxpalatl was drank only at the 
most solemn feasts : no one was allowed to taste it at any other time. Cla- 
vigero, Lon. 1786, vol. i, 251 and 265. The Fontinalia of the Romans, 
were religious festivals, held in October, in honor of the Nymphs of wells 
and fountains ; part of the ceremonies consisted in throwing nosegays into 
fountains, and decorating the curbs of wells with wreaths of flowers. 

The Jews had a religious festival in connection with water, the origin 
of which is not clearly ascertained. It was kept on the last day of the 
feast of tabernacles, when they drew water with great ceremony from 
the pool of Siloah and conveyed it to the temple. a It is supposed, the Sa- 

°Uni. Hist, i, 607. 



Chap. 5.] Relating to Wells. 35 

vior alludes to this practice, when on " the last day, that great day of the 
> feast, he stood and cried, saying, if any man thirst, let him come unto me, 
and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his 
belly shall flow rivers of living waters." John, vii, 37. One of the five 
solemn festivals of the people of Pegu, is ■ the feast of water,' during 
which, ' the king, nobles and all the people throw water upon one another.' 
Ovington's Voy. to Surat. 1689. 597. The superstitious veneration for wells, 
induced the ancients to erect temples near, and sometimes over them ; as 
the fountain of Apollo, near the temple of Jupiter Ammon ; the well 
Zemzem in the temple of Mecca, &c. In accordance with this prevailing 
custom, we find the prophet Joel speaks of a fountain which should come 
forth out of the house of the Lord, and water the valley, hi, 18. And 
when Jeroboam built a temple, that the ten tribes might not be obliged to 
go to Jerusalem to worship, and there be seduced from him, Josephus 
tells us, that he built it by the fountains of the lesser Jordan. Antiq. viii, 
cap. 8. In the temple of Isis, at Poaipeii, the * sacred well' has been 
found. Pompeii, i, 277, 279. 

The ancient custom of enclosing wells in religious edifices was adopted 
by both Christians and Mahommedans. Among the latter it is still con 
tinued, and it is not altogether abandoned by the former. 

" This afternoon," says Fryer, speaking of one of the mosques in India, 
" their sanctum sanctorum was open, the priest entering in barefoot, and 
prostrating himself on one of the mats spread on the floor, whither I must 
not have gone, could his authority have kept me out. The walls were 
white and clean but plain, only the commandments wrote in Arabic at the 
west end, were hung over a table in an arched place, where the priest ex- 
pounds, on an ascent of seven steps, railed at top with stone very hand- 
somely. Underneath are fine cool vaults, and stone stairs to descend to a 
deep tank" 

As it was formerly death to a christian who entered a mosque, we shall 
add a more recent instance. In 1831, Mr. St. John disguised himself, 
like Burckhardt, in the costume of a native, and visited the mosques of 
Cairo. In that of Sultan Hassan, he observes, " ascending a long flight 
of steps, and passing under a magnificent doorway, we entered the vesti- 
bule, and proceeded towards the most sacred portion of the edifice, where,, 
on stepping over a small railing, it was necessary to take off our babooshes, 
or red Turkish shoes. Here we beheld a spacious square court, paved 
with marble of various colors, fancifully arranged, with a beautiful oc- 
tagonal marble fountain in the centre." Egypt and Mohammed Ali, ii, 338> 
It is the same in Persia. Tavern. Trav. Lon. 1678. 29. The temples 
of India says Sonnerat, have a sacred tank, deified by the Brahmins 
The figures of gods are sometimes thrown ' into a tank or well.' Voy. i, 
111, 132. In old times, churches were removed from other buildings, 
and were surrounded with courts, in the centre of which there were 
fountains, where people washed before going to prayers. Moreri Die. In 
one of the old churches at Upsal, is an ancient well, that had formerly 
been famous ' for its miraculous cures.' Woden's well is still shown 
in the same city. It was in the vicinity of the old temple of that great 
northern deity. De la Mortraye's Trav. ii, 262. Van Braam noticed a 
well in one of the large temples of China. Journ. ii, 224. ' Sacred 
springs,' are mentioned by Juvenal. 3 Sat. 30. Pliny speaks of fountains 
and wells of water as very ' wholesome and proper for the cure of many 
diseases ;' to which, he says, there is ascribed some divine power, inso- 
much that they give names to sundry gods and goddesses, xxxi, 2. The 
Celts venerated lakes, rivers, and fountains, into which they threw gold. 



36 Superstitions of the Anglo Saxons, [Book I. 

The Britons and Picts did the same. Scot. Gael, 258. Mezeray, in his 
History of France, when speaking of the church in the third and fourth 
centuries, remarks, ' Hitherto very few of the French had received the 
light of the gospel ; they yet adored trees, fountains, serpents, and birds/ 
i, 4. In the eighth century, the council of Soissons condemned a heretic, 
who built oratories and set up crosses near fountains, &c. lb. 113. 

Ancient superstitions with regard to water are still practised more or 
less over a great part of the world. At the first new moon in October, 
the Hindoos hold a great celebration to their Deities. " The next moon, 
their women flock to the sacred wells" Fryer, 110. Many of the cere- 
monies performed in old times by women in honor of wells and fountains, 
are yet practised in some of the Grecian islands. There the females still 
dance round the wells, the ancient Callichorus, accompanied with songs in 
honor of Ceres. Dr. Clarke. " I have just returned this morning," (says Mr. 
Campbell in his Letters from the South, Phila. Ed. 1836, 102,) "from wit- 
nessing a superstitious ceremony, which, though unwarranted by the Ko- 
ran, is practised by all Mahometans here, [Algiers] black, brown, and 
white, nay by the Jews also. It consists in sacrificing the life of some 
eatable animal to one of the devils who inhabit certain fountains near Al- 
giers. The victims were fowls, they were dipped in the sacred sea, as 
Homer calls it, after which the high priest took them to a neighboring 
fountain, and having waved his knife thrice around the head of an old wo- 
man, who sat squatting beside it, cut their throats," &c. 

The custom was probably a common one in ancient Nineveh ; for once 
a year the peasants assemble and sacrifice a sheep at Thisbe's well, with 
music and other festivities. The Greeks are so much attached to grottoes 
and wells, that " there is scarcely one in all Greece and the islands, which 
is not consecrated to the Virgin, who seems to have succeeded the ancient 
nymphs in the guardianship of these places.* 

The supposed sanctity of wells also led to the custom of interring the 
bodies of saints or holy persons near them ; thus in all parts of Egypt, 
the tombs of saints are found in the vicinity of those places, " where the 
wandering dervishes stop to pray, and less pious travelers to quench their 
thirst." Some, says Fryer, are buried with " their heels upwards, like 
Diogenes." 

Worship of wells, like many other superstitions of Pagan origin, was 
early incorporated with the ceremonies of the christian church, and carried 
to an idolatrous excess. A schism took place in Persia among the Arme- 
nians, in the tenth century; one party was accused of 'despising the holy 
well of Vagarsciebat.' In Europe it was at one time universal. In En- 
gland, in the reigns of Canute and Edgar, edicts were issued prohibiting 
well worship. When Hereward the Saxon hero, held the marshes of 
Ely against the Norman conqueror, he said he heard his hostess conversing 
with a witch at midnight! he arose silently from his bed, and followed 
them into the garden, to a ' fountain of water/ and there he 'heard them 
holding converse with the spirit of the fountain.' From a collection of 
Anglo Saxon remains, the following example is taken. " If any one ob- 
serve lots or divinations, or keep his wake, [watch] at any loclls, or at 
any other created things, except at God's church, let him fast three years ; 
the first one on bread and water," &c. In a Saxon homily against witch- 
craft and magic, in the library of the University of Cambridge, it is said, 
"some men are so blind, that they bring their offerings to immovable rocks, 
and also to trees and to wells, as witches do teach." b The Hindoos still wor- 

*Rich's Nar. of a Residence in Koordistan. ii, 42. b Foreign Quarterly. July, 1838. 



Chap. 6.] Depth of Wells. 37 

ship stones, trees, and water, and make offerings to them. a In a manu- 
script written in the early part of the fifteenth century, there is a humor- 
ous song, in which there is an allusion to this superstition. Tt begins thus : 

' The last tyme I the icel woke 
Sir John caght me with a croke, 
He made me swere be bel and boke 
I shuld not tel.' 

Even so late as the seventeenth century, people in Scotland were in the 
habit of visiting wells, at which they performed numerous acts of super- 
stition. Shaw, in his History of the Province of Moray, says that 'heathen 
customs were much practised among the people,' and among them, he in- 
stances their ' performing pilgrimages to wells,' and ' building chapels to 
fountains.' 1 * At the present time in some parts of England, remains of 
well worship are preserved, in the custom of performing annual proces- 
sions to them, decorating them with wreaths and chaplets of flowers, 
singing of hymns, and even reading a portion of the gospel as part of the 
ceremonies. 

These same customs gave rise to the numerous lioly wells, which for- 
merly abounded throughout the old world, and the memory of many of 
which is still preserved in names of towns. In the church of Nanterre, 
near Paris, the birth place of Saint Genevieve, is a well, by the water of 
which, this patroness of the Parisians miraculously restored her blind 
mother and many others to sight ! Breval's Eu. 307. Saint Winifred's 
well in Flintshire, Eng. from its sacred character gave name to the town 
of Holywell. Mr. Pennant says, the custom of visiting this well in pil- 
grimage, and offering up devotions there, was not in his time entirely laid 
aside: "in the summer, a few are to be seen in the water, in deep devo- 
tion up to their chin for hours, sending up their prayers, or performing a 
number of evolutions round the polygonal well." Even so late as 1804, 
a Roman catholic bishop of Wolverhampton, took much pains to persuade 
the world, that an ignorant proselyte of his, named Winifred White was 
miraculously cured at this well of various chronic diseases ! 

The custom of ' house-warming' is very ancient ; the same ceremonies , 
were formerly performed on the completion of new wells. 



CHAP TE R VI. 

Wells continued : Depth of ancient wells— In Hindostan — Well of Tyre — Cartkagenian wells — Wells 
in Greece, Herculcneum and Pompeii — Wells without curbs — Ancient laws to prevent accidents froia 
persons and animals falling into them — Sagacity and revenge of an elephant — Hvias — Archelaus 
of Macedon — Thracian soldier and a lady at Thebes — Wooden covers — Wells in Judea — Reasons for 
not placing curbs round wells — Scythians — Arabs — Aquilius — Abraham — Hezekiah — David — Mardo- 
nius — Moses and the people of Edom — Burckhardt in Petra — Woman of Bahurim — Persian tradition — 
Ali, the fourth Caliph — Covering wells with large stones — Mahommedan tradition— Themistocles — Edicts 
of Greek emperors — Well at Heliopolis — Juvenal — Roman and Grecian curbs of marble — Capitals of 
ancient columns converted into curbs for wells. 

A knowledge of the depth and other circumstances, relating to some 
ancient wells, is necessary to a due investigation of the various methods 
of raising water from them. We cannot indeed form a correct judgment 
of the latter, without some acquaintance with the former. 

•Ward's Hindoos, 342. 352. b Hone's Every Day Book, ii, 636, 685. Fosbroke, 684. 



38 Wells without Curls. [Book I 

The wells of Asia are generally of great depth, and of course were 
so in former times. In Guzzerat, they are from eighty to a hundred feet ; 
in the adjoining province of Mulwah, they are frequently three hundred 
feet. In Ajmeer, they are from one to two hundred feet. Mr. Elphin- 
stone in his mission to Cabaul observes, ' the wells are often three hun- 
dred feet deep ; one was three hundred and forty five ;' and with this 
enormous depth, some are only three feet in diameter. The famous well 
of ancient Tyre, ' whose merchants were princes, and whose traffickers 
were the honorable of the earth,' is, according to some travelers, without 
a bottom ; but La Roque, is said by Volney, to have found it at the depth 
of ' six and thirty fathom.' 

Shalmanezer besieged this city of mechanics for five years, without 
being able to take it ; at last he cut off the waters of this well, when the 
inhabitants dug others within the city ; after which they held out against 
Nebuchadnezzar, and the whole power of the Babylonian empire for 
thirteen years ; being the longest siege on record, except that of Ashdod. 
Jos. Antiq. ix, 14. Ancient Carthagenian wells of great depth have been 
already mentioned. Dr. Shaw (Trav. 135,) observes of a tribe of the Ka- 
byles, ' their country is very dry, they have no fountains or rivulets, and 
in order to obtain water, they dig wells ' to the depth of from one to two 
hundred fathom.' Jacob's well is a hundred and nine feet, and Joseph's 
well at Cairo, near three hundred feet deep. The well Zemzem at Mecca, 
is two hundred and ten feet. ' Exceeding deep wells' in Surat, are men- 
tioned by Toreen, in Osbeck's Voyage to China. That the wells of Attica 
were generally deep, is obvious from a provision in Solon's law respecting 
them, by which a person, after digging to the depth of sixty feet without 
obtaining water, was allowed to fill a six gallon vessel twice a day at his 
neighbor's well. The frequency of not meeting with water at that depth, 
evidently gave rise to this provision.* The wells of Herculaneum and 
Pompeii, were probably all of considerable depth, if we judge from those 
that have been discovered. 



WELLS WITHOUT CURBS. 

Another feature in ancient — particularly Asiatic — wells, was, they were 
often without curbs or parapets built round them ; hence animals often 
fell into them and were killed. A very ancient law enacted, that, ' if a 
man shall open or dig a pit, [a well] and not cover it ; and an ox or an 
ass fall therein, the owner of the pit shall make it good, and give money 
to the owner of them, and the dead beasts shall be his.' Exo. xxi, 33, 34. 
This was probably an old Phenician and Egyptian law which the Is- 
raelites adopted from its obvious utility. Josephus' account of it is more 
explicit : ' let those that dig a well or a pit, be careful to lay planks over 
them, and so keep them shut up, not to hinder persons from drawing wa- 
ter, but that there may be no danger of falling into them.' Antiq. iv, 
8. Numerous examples of the utility of such a law might be produced 
from oriental histories. Benaiah, one of the three famous warriors of 
David, who broke through the hosts of the Philistines and drew water 
for him out of the well of Bethlehem, ' slew a lion in the midst of a pit in 
the time of snow.' Sam. xxiii, 20 : from Josephus, this appears to have 
been one of the ordinary wells of the country, which having no curb, 
had been left open, and the 'lion slipped and fell into it.' Antiq. vii, 12. 

1 On our way back to the town, we saw a poor ass dying in a pit, into 



n Plutarch's Life of Solon. 



Chap. 6 .] Wells without Curbs. 39 

which he had fallen with his legs tied, that being the practice of the Arabs 
when they send out these animals to feed.' a The custom of the Arabs in 
this respect has probably, like many others, undergone no change. It ex- 
plains the necessity of the law in Exodus, as quoted above. 

As two elephant drivers, each on his elephant, one of which was re- 
markably large and powerful, and the other small and weak, were ap- 
proaching a well, the latter carried at the end of his proboscis a bucket 
by which to raise the water. The larger animal instigated by his driver, 
(who was not provided with one,) seized and easily wrested it from the 
weaker elephant, which, though unable to resent the insult, obviously felt 
it. At length, watching his opportunity when the other was standing amid 
the crowd with his side to the well, he retired backwards in a very quiet 
and unsuspicious manner, and then rushing forward with all his might, 
drove his head against the side of the robber, and fairly pushed him into 
the well — the surface of the water in which, was twenty feet below the 
level of the ground. 

But animals were not the only sufferers : — There are passages in an- 
cient authors which indicate the loss of human life both accidentally and 
by design, in consequence of the absence of curbs to wells. Thus Hylas 
who accompanied Hercules on the Argonautic expedition, went ashore to 
draw water from a well or fountain, and he fell in and was drowned. 
Virgil represents the companions of Hylas after missing him, as spread- 
ing themselves along the coast and loudly repeating his name : 

And Hylas, whom his messmates loud deplore, 
While Hylas! Hylas! rings from all the shore. 

Ec. vi, 48. Wrangham. 

Archelaus of Macedon, a contemporary of Socrates, ascended the throne 
by the most horrid crimes. Among others whom he murdered, was his 
own brother, a boy only seven years old. He threw his body into a well, 
and endeavored to make his mother believe that the child fell in, * as he 
was running after a goose.' Bayle. 

When Alexander, like a demon, destroyed the city of Thebes, (the ca- 
pital of one of the States of Greece,) and murdered six thousand of its 
inhabitants, a party of Thracian soldiers belonging to his army demolished 
thehouseof Timoclea, a lady of distinguished virtue and honor. The soldiers 
carried off the booty, and their captain having violated the lady, asked 
her, if she had not concealed some of her treasures : she told him she 
had, and taking him alone with her into the garden, she showed him 
a well, into which she said she had thrown every thing of value. Now 
we are told, that as he stooped down to look into the well, this high spi- 
rited and much injured lady pushed him in, and killed him with stones. b 

From these accounts, it appears that wells belonging to private houses in 
ancient Greece, were sometimes without curbs, although they probably had 
portable or wooden covers. That these were common, is evident from a pas- 
sage already quoted from Josephus ; and the remains of one have been 
discovered in Pompeii. c The private well mentioned in 2 Sam. xvii, 18, 
had no curb. Indeed it is evident from the New Testament, that the an- 
cient custom of leaving the upper surface of wells level with the ground, 
prevailed among the Jews, through the whole of their history, from their 
independence as a nation, to their final overthrow by Titus. ' What man 
among you having one sheep, if it fall into a pit on the sabbath day, will 



a St. John's Egypt, i, 354. b Plutarch's Life of Alexander. c Pompeii, ii, 204. 



40 Reasons for not placing Curbs round Wells. [Book I, 

he not lay hold of it and lift it out 1 ?' Matt, xii, 11. And again in Luke, 
' which of you shall have an ass, or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not 
straightway pull him out on the sabbath day.' xiv, 5. 

In these passages, which are parallel to those quoted from Exodus and 
Josephus, the word ' pit' is synonymous with ' well.' In Antiq. vii, 12, 
' the well of Bethlehem,' is called a ' pit.' Wells without curbs are met 
with in Judea and the east generally, at the present time, although they 
are not so numerous as formerly. Mr. Stephens, in his ' Incidents of 
Travel,' observed on the road to Gaza, 'two remarkable wells of the very 
best Roman workmanship, about fifty feet deep, lined with large hard 
stones, as firm and perfect as on the day on which they were laid; the up- 
permost layer on the top of the well, ' was on a level with the pavement.* 
In some illustrations of the Book of Genesis, executed in the fourth or 
fifth century, one represents the interview between Rebecca and Eliezer ; 
the well is square, and the curb but a few inches high. 



REASONS FOR NOT PLACING CURBS ROUND THE MOUTHS OF WELLS. 

The motives which induced the ancients to leave their wells without 
curbs were various: 

1. That they might be more readily concealed. This was a universal 
custom in times of war. When Darius invaded Scythia, the inhabitants 
did not attempt an open resistance, but covered up their wells and springs 
and retired. Herod, iv, 120. Mr. Elphinstone, in his mission to Cabaul, 
says, the people ' have a mode of covering their wells with boards, heaped 
with sand, that effectually conceals them from an enemy.' Diodorus Si- 
culus, remarked the same of the Bedouin Arabs, eighteen centuries ago, 
and they still practise it. Travelers in the Lybian desert are often six and 
seven days without water, and frequently perish for want of it ; ' the 
drifting sand having covered the marks of the wells.' b Wells, when thus con- 
cealed ' can only be found by persons whose profession it is to pilot cara- 
vans across this ocean of sand, and the sagacity with which these men per- 
form their duty is wonderful ;' like pilots at sea with nothing but the stars 
to direct them. 

2. To prevent them from being poisoned or filled up, both of which 
frequently occurred. The Roman General Aquilius conquered the cities 
of the kingdom of Pergamus, one by one, by poisoning the waters. This 
horrid crime has always prevailed. In 1320, many Jews were burnt in 
France, while others were massacred by the infuriate people, under the 
belief that they had poisoned the wells and fountains of Paris. The Earl 
of Savoy was poisoned in this manner in 1384, and the practice was com- 
mon in the fifteenth century. Some of the wells belonging to Abraham, 
were stopped up by the inhabitants. ' And Isaac digged again the wells 
of water, which they had digged in the days of Abraham his father, for 
the Philistines had stopped them, after the death of Abraham.' Gen. xxvi, 
18. ' We walked on some distance to a well, which we found full of 
sand ; Hussein scooped it out with his hands, when the water rose and 
all of us drank.' Lindsay's Trav. Let. 7. When the Assyrians under 
Senacherib, invaded Judea in the eighth century, B. C. ' Hezekiah took 
counsel with his princes and mighty men, to stop the waters of the foun- 
tains which were wi/Jiout the city • and they stopped all the fountains, 
saying, why should the king of Assyria come here and find much water V 
2 Kings, iii, 19. 25. 

a Vol. ii, 101, and Lindsay's Trav. Let. 9. •> Ogilvy's Africa, 281. 
'Mezeray's France. Lon. 1683. pp. 349, 408, 414. 



Chap. 6.J Great Value of Water. 41 

The custom of leaving the principal supply of water without the walla 
of the more ancient cities, is remarkable ; and the reason for it has not 
yet been satisfactorily explained. The water which supplied Alba Longa, 
lay in a very deep glen, and was therefore scarcely defensible ; but the 
springs of the Scamander at Troy, of Enneacrunus at Athens ; of Dirce 
at Thebes, and innumerable others, prove that such instances were com- 
mon.* When David waged war against the Ammonites, his success, ac- 
cording to Josephus, was chiefly owing to his general cutting off their 
waters, and especially those of a particular well. Antiq. vii, 1. Mardo- 
nius stopped up the Gargaphian fountain, which supplied the Grecian ar- 
my with water, an act which brought on in its vicinity, the famous battle 
of Platea, in which he was slain, and the power of Persia in Greece 
finally prostrated. A remarkable instance of the labor and perseverance 
of ancient soldiers, in cutting off a well or fountain from besieged places, 
is given by Caesar in his Commentaries on the War in Gaul, viii, 33. 

3. To prevent the water from being stolen; which could scarcely have 
been prevented at wells with curbs, for they could not then have been con- 
cealed. We must bear in mind that the extreme scarcity of water in the 
east, required a vigilant and parsimonious care of it ; and hence continual 
quarrels arose from attempts to purloin it, or to take it by force. ' And 
the herdsmen of Gerar did strive with Isaac's herdsmen, saying, the 
water is ours.' Gen. xxvi, 20. This kind of strife, says Dr. Richardson, 
between the different villagers, still exists, as it did in the days of Abra- 
ham and Lot. It was customary for shepherds to seize on the wells be- 
fore others came, lest there should not, be sufficient water for all their 
flocks, and it was at an occurrence of this kind, that Moses first became ac- 
quainted with Zipporah and her sisters. Jos. Antiq. ii, 11. " Nearly six 
hours beyond the ruined town of Kournou, and two beyond the dry bed 
of a small stream called El Gerara, [the brook of Gerar?] we were sur- 
prised at finding two large and deep wells, beautifully built of hewn stone. 
The uppermost course, and about a dozen troughs for watering cattle dis- 
posed round them, of a coarse white marble ; they were evidently coeval 
with the Romans. Quite a patriarchal scene presented itself as we drew 
near to the wells ; the Bedouins were watering their flocks ; two men at 
each well letting down the skins and pulling them up again, with almost 
ferocious haste, and with quick savage shouts." Lindsay's Trav. Let. 9. 

The scarcity of water in those countries has from the remotest times 
made it an object of merchandise. — " Ye shall also buy water of them for 
money that ye may drink." Deut. ii, 6, 28. And Jeremiah — " we have, 
drunken our water for money." Lam. v, 4. See Ezekiel, iv, 16, 17. 
This value of water may be perceived in the negotiation of Moses with 
the king of Edom, for a passage through that country. He pledged him- 
self that his countrymen would not injure the fields or the vineyards ; 
"neither," says he, "will we drink of the waters of the wells;" and in a 
subsequent proposition, he adds, " if I and my cattle drink of thy waters, 
then I will pay for it." Num. xx, 17, 19. It is we think evident from 
the text, that the great quantities of water which such a host would re- 
quire, was the principal objection urged by the people of Edom; they 
were afraid, and very naturally too, that a million of souls might drain all 
their wells while passing through the land, a calamity that might prove 
fatal to themselves. Brooks and rivers, were dried up by the army of 
Xerxes as he advanced towards Greece. 

It may be observed here, that when in 1811, Burckhardt discovered 

a Gell's Topography of Rome, i, 34. 
6 



42 Wells covered by large Stones. [Book L 

Petra, the long lost capital of Edom, an intense interest was excited 
among the learned men of Europe, and several hastened to behold the 
most extraordinary city of the world ; a city excavated out of the rocks, 
whose origin goes back to the times of Esau, the ' father of Edom,' and 
which had for more than a thousand years, been completely lost to the 
civilized world. But the natives swore, as in the times of Moses, they 
should not enter their country, nor drink of their water, and they threatened 
to shoot them like dogs, if they attempted it. It was with much difficulty 
and danger, that Burckhardt at length succeeded in obtaining a glimpse 
of this singular city. He was disguised as an Arab, and passed under the 
name of Sheik Ibrahim. The difficulty and danger of a visit to Petra, 
is now however in a great measure removed by the present Pasha, Ma- 
hommed Ali. 

From the custom of concealing many ancient wells, we learn the im- 
portant fact, that machines for raising the water could not have been at- 
tached to, or 'permanently placed near them. As these, as well as curbs 
or parapets projecting above the ground, would have betrayed to ene- 
mies and strangers their location. When the woman at Bahurim secreted 
David's spies in the well belonging to her house, and " spread a covering 
over the well's mouth, and spread ground corn thereon;" 2 Sam. xvii, 19, 
her device could not have succeeded, if a curb had enclosed its mouth, 
or if any permanent machine had been erected to raise the water from it; 
as these would have indicated the well to the soldiers of Absalom, who 
would certainly have examined it, because wells were frequently used 
as hiding places in those days. There is a tradition in Persia that one of 
the Armenian patriarchs, was concealed several years in a well, during 
the persecution of the Christians under Dioclesian and Maximinian ; and 
was ' privately relieved by the daily charity of a poor godly woman.' 
Fryer, 271. 

When Ali the fourth Caliph of the Arabians, marched with ninety 
thousand men into Syria, the army was in want of water. An old hermit, 
whose cell was near the camp, was applied to ; he said he knew but of 
one cistern, which might contain two or three buckets of water. The 
Caliph replied that the ancient patriarchs had dug wells in that neighbor- 
hood. The hermit said there was a tradition of a well whose mouth was 
closed by a stone of an enormous size, but no person knew where it was. 
Ali caused his men to dig in a spot which he pointed out, and not far from 
the surface, the mouth of the well was found. a 

Where wells were too well known to be concealed, as those in the 
neighborhood of towns, villages, &c. they were sometimes secured by 
large stones placed over them, which required the combined strength 
of several persons to remove. ' A great stone was upon the well's mouth; 
and they rolled the stone from the well's mouth and watered the sheep, 
and put the stone again upon the well's mouth.' Gen. xxix, 2, 3. The Ma- 
hommedans have a tradition that the well at which Moses watered the 
flocks of his father-in-law, was covered by a stone which required several 
men to remove it. It is indeed obvious large stones only could have been 
used, for small ones could not extend across the wells, which were fre- 
quently of large diameter. Jacob's well is nine feet across, and some 
were larger The curb round the well Zemzem at Mecca, is ten feet in 
diameter. " Another time we passed an ancient well," says Lindsay, Let. 
10, " in an excursion from Jerusalem to Jericho and the Dead Sea, its 
mouth sealed with a large stone, with a hole in the centre, through which 

a Martigny's History of the Arabians, ii, 49. 



Chap. 6.] Roman and Grecian Curhs. 43 

we threw a pebble, but there was no water, and we should have been 
sorry had there been any, for our united strengtli could not have removed 
the seal." 

Notwithstanding the precautions used, shepherds were often detected 
in fraudulently watering their flocks at their neighbors' wells, to prevent 
which, locks were used to secure the covers. These continued to be 
used till recent times. M. Chardin noticed them in several parts of Asia. 
The wells at Suez, according to Niebuhr, are surrounded by a strong 
wall to keep out the Arabs, and entered by a door 'fastened with enor- 
mous clamps of iron.' In Greece as in Asia, those were fined who stole 
water. When Themistocles during his banishment was in Sardis, he ob- 
served in the temple of Cybele a female figure of brass, called ' Hydro- 
fth&rus 9 or Water Bearer, which he himself had caused to be made and 
dedicated out of the fines of such as had stolen the water, or diverted the 
stream* One of the Greek emperors of Constantinople issued an edict 
A. D. 404, imposing a fine of a pound of gold for every ounce of water 
surreptitiously taken from the reservoirs. b And a more ancient ruler re- 
marked that ' stolen waters are sweet.' Proverbs, ix, 17. The ancient 
Peruvians had a similar law. 

Curbs or parapets were generally placed round the mouths of wells in 
the cities of Greece and Rome, as appears from many of them preserved to 
the present time, as well as those discovered in Pompeii and Herculaneum. 
The celebrated mosaic pavement at Preneste, contains the representation 
of an ancient well; by some authors supposed to be the famous fountain 
of Heliopolis. Montfaucon and Dr. Shaw have given a figure of it. The 
curb is represented as built of brick or cut stone. Curbs were generally 
massive cylinders of marble and mostly formed of one block, but some- 
times of two, cramped together with iron. Their exterior resembled 
round altars. Those of the Greeks were ornamented with highly wrought 
sculptures and were about twenty inches high. Roman curbs were ge- 
nerally plain, but one has been found in the street of the Mercuries at 
Pompeii, beautifully ornamented with triglyphs. To these curbs Juvenal 
appears to allude : 

Oh ! how much more devoutly should we cling 

To thoughts that hover round the sacred spring, 

Were it still margined with its native green, 

And not a marble near the spot were seen. Sat. iii, 30 Badham. 

That Roman "wells were generally protected by curbs, appears also from 
a remark of the elder Pliny : " at Gades the fountain next to the temple of 
Hercules, is enclosed about like a well." B. ii, 97. Dr. Shaw mentions se- 
veral Roman wells with corridors round, and cupolas over them, in various 
parts of Mauritania. Trav. 237. Mr. Dodwell describes the rich curb of 
a Corinthian well, ten figures of divinities being carved on it. Such deco- 
rations he says were common to the sacred wells of Greece. 

In various parts of Asia and Egypt, the finest columns have been bro- 
ken and hollowed out to serve as curbs to wells ; and in some instances, 
the capitals of splendid shafts may be seen appropriated to the same pur- 
pose. Although such scenes are anything but pleasant to the enlightened 
traveler, the preservation of valuable fragments of antiquity has been se- 
cured by these and similar applications of them. They certainly are less 
subject to destruction, as curbs of wells, than when employed, like the 
fine Corinthian capital of Parian marble, which Dr. Shaw observed at 
Arzew, ' as a block for a blacksmith's anvil.'' Trav. 29, 30. 

a Plutarch's L'fe of Themistocles. b Hydraulia, p. 232. Lon. 1835. 



44 Description of ancie?it Wells. [Book 1 



CHAPTER VII. 

Wwlls concluded: Description of Jacob's well — Of Zemzera in Mecca — Of Joseph's well at Cairo — 
Reflections on wells — Oldest monuments extant — Wells at Elim— Bethlehem — Cos — Scyros — Heliopolis 
— Persepolis— Jerusalem — Troy — Ephesus — Tadmor — Mizra — Sarcophagi employed as watering- troughs 
-— Stone coffin of Richard III used as one — Ancient American wells — Indicate the existence in past times 
of a more refined people than the present red men — Their examination desirable — Might furnish (like 
the wells at Athens,) important data of former ages. 

A description of some celebrated wells may here be inserted, as we 
shall have occasion to refer to them hereafter. Jacob's well, is one of 
the most ancient and interesting. Through a period of thirty-five cen- 
turies it has been used by that patriarch's descendants, and distinguished 
by his name. This well is, as every reader of scripture knows, near Sy- 
char, the ancient Shecliem, on the road to Jerusalem, and has been visited 
by pilgrims in all ages. Long before the christian era, it was greatly re- 
veied, and subsequently it has been celebrated on account of the inter- 
view which the Savior had with the woman of Samaria near it. Its lo- 
cation according to Dr. Clarke is so distinctly marked by the Evangelist, 
and so little liable to uncertainty from the circumstances of the well itself, 
and the features of the country, that if no tradition existed for its identity, 
the site of it could hardly be mistaken. 

The date of its construction may, for aught that is known to the con- 
trary, extend far beyond the times of Jacob; for we are not informed that 
it was digged by him. As it is on land which he purchased for a residence, 
" of the sons of Hamor the father of Shechem," and was in the vicinity 
of a Canaanitish town ; it may have been constructed by the forme* 
owners of the soil, and probably was so. The woman of Samaria when 
conversing with the Savior respecting it, asks ' Art thou greater than our 
father Jacob who gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, his children 
and cattle %" John, iv, 12. She does not say he dug it. This famous 
well is one hundred and jive feet deep, and nine feet in diameter, and when 
Maundrell visited it, it contained fifteen feet of water. Its great an- 
tiquity will not appear very extraordinary, if we reflect that it is bored 
through the solid rock, and therefore could not be destroyed, except by 
an earthquake or some other convulsion of nature ; indeed wells of this 
description, are the most durable of all man's labors, and may, for aught 
we know, last as long as the world itself. 

The well Zcmzem at Mecca, may be regarded as another very ancient 
one. It is considered by Mahometans one of the three holiest things in 
the world, and as the source whence the great progenitor of the Arabs 
was refreshed when he and his mother left his father's house. " She saw 
a well of water, and she went and filled the bottle with water and gave 
the lad to drink." Gen. xxi, 19. This well, the Caaba and the black 
stone, a were connected with the idolatry of the ancient Arabs, centuries 
before the time of Mahomet. The Caaba is said to have been built by 
Abraham and Ishmael, and it is certain that their names have been con- 
nected with it from the remotest ages. Diodorus Siculus, mentions it as 

a This stone like those of the Hindoos and the one mentioned in Acts, xix, "fell 
down from heaven" and is probably a meteorite. 



Chap. 7] Well Zemzem. 45 

being held in great veneration by the Arabs in his time. [50, B. C] The 
ceremonies still performed, of " encircling the Caaba seven times, kissing 
the black stone, and drinking of the water of the well Zemzem," by the 
pilgrims, were practices of the ancient idolaters, and which Mahomet, as an 
adroit j>olitician, incorporated into his system, when unable to repress 
them. The conduct of the pilgrims when approaching this well and 
drinking of its water, has direct reference to that of Hagar, and to her 
feelings when searching for water to preserve the life of her expiring 
son. 

If we reflect on the infinite value of wells in Syria — on the jealous care 
with which they have always been preserved — that while they afforded 
good water, they could never be lost — that Mecca is one of the most an- 
cient cities of the world, the supposed Mesa of the scriptures, Gen. x, 30, 
— and that this well is the only one in the city, whose waters can be 
drunk : — we cannot but admit the possibility at least, that it is the identi- 
cal one, as the Arabs contend, of whose waters, Ishmael and his mother 
partook. 

We are not aware that any modern author has had an opportunity of 
closely examining it ; it being death for a christian to enter the Caaba. 
Burckhardt visited the temple in the disguise of a pilgrim, but we believe 
he had not an opportunity to ascertain any particulars relating to its depth, 
&c. Purchas, quoting Barthema, who visited Mecca in 1503, says it is 
" three score and ten yards deepe," [210 feet,] " thereat stand sixe or 
eight men, appointed to draw water for the people, who after their seven- 
fold ceremonie come to the brinke," &c. Pil. p. 306. In Crichton's His- 
tory of Arabia, Ed. 1833. Vol. ii, 218, this well is said to be fifty-six feet 
to the surface of the water. The curb is of fine white marble, five feet 
high, and seven feet eight inches in its interior diameter. In the 317th year of 
the Hegira, the Karmatians slew seventeen thousand pilgrims within the cir- 
cumference of the Caaba, and filled this famous well with the dead bo- 
dies; — they also carried off the Black Stone. 

Joseph's well. — The most remarkable well ever made by man, is Jo- 
seph's well at Cairo. Its magnitude, and the skill displayed in its con- 
struction, which is perfectly unique, have never been surpassed. All 
travelers have spoken of it with admiration. 

This stupendous well is an oblong square, twenty-four feet by eighteen ; 
being sufficiently capacious to admit within its mouth a moderate sized 
house. It is excavated (of these dimensions,) through solid rock to the 
depth of one hundred and sixty-five feet where it is enlarged into a capa- 
cious chamber, in the bottom of which is formed a basin or reservoir, to 
receive the water raised from below, (for this chamber is not the bottom 
of the well.) On one side of the reservoir another shaft is continued, one 
hundred and thirty feet lower, where it emerges through the rock into a 
bed of gravel, in which the water is found. The whole depth, being two 
hundred and ninety-seven feet. The lower shaft is not in the same ver- 
tical line with the upper one, nor is it so large, being fifteen feet by 
nine. As the water is first raised into the basin, by means of ma- 
chinery propelled by horses or oxen ivithin the chamber, it may be 
asked, how are these animals conveyed to that depth in this tremendous 
pit, and by what means do they ascend ] It is the solution of this prob- 
lem that renders Joseph's well so peculiarly interesting, and which indi- 
cates an advanced state of the arts, at the period of its construction. 

A spiral passage-w r ay is cut through the rock, from the surface of the 
ground to the chamber, independent of the well, round which it winds 
with so gentle a descent, th?t persons sometimes ride up or down upon 



Joseph's Well, 



[Book 1. 




^ 



-> 



^v: 



asses or mules. It is six feet four in- 
ches wide, and seven feet two inches 
high. Between it and the interior of 
the well, a wall of rock is left, to pre- 
vent persons falling into, or even look- 
ing down it, (which in some cases would 
be equally fatal,) except through certain 
openings or windows, by means of which, 
it is faintly lighted from the interior of 
the well : by this passage the animals 
descend, which drive the machinery that 
raises the water from the lower shaft 
into the reservoir or basin, from which 
it is again elevated by similar machinery, 
and other oxen on the surface of the 
ground. See figure. In the lower shaft, a 
path is also cut down to the water, but as 
no partition is left between it and the well, 
it is extremely perilous for strangers to 
descend. 

The square openings represented on 
each side of the upper shaft, are sec- 
tions of the spiral passage, and the zig- 
zag lines indicate its direction. The 
wheels at the top carry endless ropes, 
the lower parts of which reach down 
to the water ; to these, earthenware va- 
ses are secured by ligatures, see A, A, 
at equal distances through the whole of 
their length, so that when the machinery 
is moved, these vessels ascend full of 
water on one side of the wheels, dis- 
charge it into troughs as they pass over 
them and descend in an inverted po- 
sition on the other. For a further de- 
scription of this apparatus, see the chap- 
ter on the chain of pots. 

This celebrated production of former 
times, it will be perceived, resembles an 
enormous hollow screw, the centre of 
which forms the well, and the threads, a 
winding stair-case round it. To erect 
of granite a flight of " geometrical" or 
" well stairs," two or three hundred feet 
high, on the surface of the ground, 
would require extraordinary skill; al- 
though in the execution, every aid from 
rules, measures, and the light of day, 
would guide the workmen at every step ; 
but to begin such a work at the top, 
and construct it downwards by excava- 
tion alone, in the dark bowels of the 
earth, is a more arduous undertaking, 
especially as deviations from the correct 
lines could not be remedied ; yet in Jo- 



No 7. Section of Joseph's Well. 



Chap. 7.] At Cairo. 47 

seph's well, the partition of rock between the pit and the passage-way, 
and the uniform inclination of the latter, seem to have been ascertained 
with equal precision, as if the whole had been constructed of cut stone on 
the surface. Was the pit, or the passage, formed first ; or were they simul- 
taneously carried on, and the excavated masses from both borne up the 
latter % The extreme thinness of the partition wall, excited the astonish- 
ment of M. Jomard, whose account of the well is inserted in the second 
volume of Memoirs in Napoleon's great Work on Egypt, part 2nd, p. 
691. It is, according to him, but sixteen centimetres thick, [about six in- 
ches !] He justly remarks that it must have required singular care to 
leave and preserve so small a portion while excavating the rock from both 
sides of it. It would seem no stronger in proportion, than sheets of 
pasteboard placed on edge, to support one end of the stairs of a modern 
built house, for it should be borne in mind, that the massive roof of the spiral 
passage next the taell, has nothing but this film of rock to support it, 
or to prevent such portions from falling, as are loosened by fissures, or 
such, as from changes in the direction of the strata, are not firmly united 
to the general mass. But this is not all : thin and insufficient as it may 
seem, the bold designer has pierced it through its whole extent with semi- 
circular openings, to admit light from the well : those on one side are 
shown in the figure. 

Opinions respecting the date of this well are exceedingly various. Po- 
cocke thought it was built by a vizier named Joseph, eight hundred years 
ago ; other authorities more generally attribute it to Saladin, the intrepid 
defender of his country against the hordes of European savages, who, un- 
der the name of crusaders, spread rapine and carnage through his land. 
His name was Yussef, [Joseph.] By the common people of Egypt, it 
has long been ascribed to the patriarch of that name, and their traditions 
are often well-founded; of which we shall give an example in the ac- 
count of the Swape. Van Sleb, who visited Egypt several times in the 
17th century, says, some of the people in his time, thought it was digged 
by spirits, and he adds, " I am almost inclined to believe it, for I cannot 
conceive how man can compass so wonderful a work." 8 This mode of 
accounting for ancient works is common among ignorant people, and may 
be considered as proof of their great antiquity. Dr. Robertson, in speak- 
ing of ancient monuments in India, remarks that they are of such high 
antiquity, that as the natives cannot, either from history or tradition, give 
any information concerning the time in which they were executed, they 
universally ascribe the formation of them to superior beings. b Some wri- 
ters believe this well to have been the work of a more scientific people 
than any of the comparatively modern possessors of Egypt — in other 
words, they think it the production of the same people that built the py- 
ramids and the unrivalled monuments of Thebes, Dendarah and Ebsam- 
boul. Lastly, Cairo is supposed by others, to occupy the site of Egyp- 
tian Babylon, and this well is considered by them, one of the remains of 
that ancient city. Amidst this variety of opinions respecting its origin, it 
is certain, that it is every way worthy of the ancient mechanics of Egypt; 
and in its magnitude exhibits one of the prominent features which cha- 
racterize all their known productions. 

Why was this celebrated well made oblong 1 ? Its designer had cer- 
tainly his reasons for it. May not this form have been intended to en- 
lighten more perfectly the interior, by sooner receiving and retaining 
longer the rays of the sun ] To what point of the compass its longest 

R The present state of Egypt, by F. Van Sleb. Lon. 1678. p. 248. b India, Appendix 



48 Reflections on Ancient Wells. [Book I. 

sides coincide, has not, that we are aware of, been recorded. Should they 
prove to be in the direction of the rising and setting sun, the reason sug- 
gested, may possibly be the true one. 

In Ogilvy's Africa, it is remarked that at the last city to the south of 
Egypt, " is a deep well, into whose bosom the sun shines at noon, while 
he passes to and again through the northern signs." p. 99. This is the 
same well that Strabo mentions at Syene, which marked the summer sol- 
stice — the day was known, when the style of the sun dial cast no shade at 
noon, and the vertical sun darted his rays to the bottom of the well. It 
was at Syene, that Eratosthenes, 220 B. C. made the first attempt to 
measure the circumference of the earth — and to the same city, the poet 
Juvenal was banished. 



REFLECTIONS ON ANCIENT WELLS. 

Before leaving this part of the subject, it may be remarked that an- 
cient wells are of very high interest, inasmuch as many of them are the 
only memorials, that have come down to us, of the early inhabitants of 
the world; and they differ from almost all other monuments of man in 
former times ; not only in their origin, design, and duration, but above all, 
in their utility. In this respect, no barren monument, of whatever 
magnitude or material, which ambition, vanity, or power, has erected, at 
the expense of the labor and lives of the oppressed, can ever be com- 
pared with them. Such monuments are, with few exceptions, proofs of a 
people's sufferings; and were generally erected to the basest of our spe- 
cies: whereas ancient wells have, through the long series of past ages, 
continually alleviated human woe; and have furnished man with one of 
nature's best gifts without the least alloy. 

It would almost appear, as if the divine Being had established a law, 
by which works of pure beneficence and real utility should endure almost 
for ever ; while those of mere magnificence, however elaborately con- 
structed, should in time pass away. The temple of Solomon — his golden 
house, ivory palaces, and splendid gardens are wholly gone ; but the plain 
cisterns, which he built to supply his people with water, remain almost as 
perfect as ever. Thus the pride of man is punished by a law, to which 
the most favored of mortals formed no exception. 

An additional interest is attached to several wells and fountains of the 
old world, from the frequent allusion to them in the Scriptures, and by 
the classical writers of Greece and Rome. In addition to those already 
named, the following may be noticed. When the Israelites left Egypt, 
" they came to Elim, where were twelve wells of water, and three score 
and ten palm trees." Now the Grove of Elim yet flourishes; and its 
fountains have neither increased nor diminished, since the Israelites 
encamped by them. a Modern travelers in Palestine often allay their 
thirst at the well which belonged to the birth place of David, the " Well 
of Bethlehem," whose waters he so greatly preferred to all others. The 
inhabitants of Cos, drink of the same spring which Hippocrates used 
twenty-three hundred years ago ; and their traditions still connect it with 
his name. The nymphs of Scyros, another island in the Egean, in the 
early ages assembled at a certain fountain to draw water for domestic 
uses. This fountain, says Dr. Clarke, exists in its original state; and is 
still the same rendezvous as formerly, of love or of gallantry, of gossip- 

a We are aware that Dr. Shaw — Travels, p. 350 — observed but nine wells. He say3, at 
that time, three of them were filled up with sand; but the whole were to be seen a 
short time previous to his visiting them, and we believe since. 



Chap. 7. Aqueducts, Fountains, and Cisterns. 49 

ping and tale telling - . Young women may be seen coming from it in 
groups, and singing, with vases on their heads, precisely as represented 
on ancient marbles. It was at Scyros where young Achilles was concealed 
to prevent his going to the Trojan war. He was placed among, and habited 
like, the daughters of Lycomedes; but Ulysses adroitly discovered him, 
by offering for sale, in the disguise of a pedler, a fine suit of armor, among 
trinkets for women. 

Heliopolis, the city of the Sun, the On of Genesis, of which Joseph's 
father-in-law was governor and priest, and whose inhabitants, according 
to Herodotus, (ii. 3.) were the "most ingenious of all the Egyptians, and 
where the philosophers of Greece assembled to acquire "the wisdom of 
Egypt," was famous for its fountain of excellent water : — this fountain, 
with a solitary obelisk, is all that remains to point out the place where 
that splendid city stood. 

Aqueducts, fountains, cisterns and wells, are in numerous instances the 
only remains of some of the most celebrated cities of the ancient world. 
Of Heliopolis, Syene and Babylon in Egypt; of Tyre, Sidon, Palmyra, 
Nineveh, Carthage, Utica, Barca, and many others; and when, in the course 
of future ages, the remaining portals and columns of Persepolis are 
entirely decayed, and its sculptures crumbled to dust : its cisterns and 
and aqueduct (both hewn out of the rock) will serve to excite the curi- 
osity of future antiquaries, when every other monument of the city to 
which they belonged has perished. The features of nature, says Dr. 
Clarke, continue the same, though works of art may be done away: the 
'beautiful gate' of the Jerusalem temple is no more, but Siloah's Foun- 
tain still flows, and Kedron yet murmurs in the Valley of Jehoshaphat. 
According to Chateaubriand, the Pool of Bethesda, a reservoir, one hun- 
dred and fifty feet by forty, constructed of large stones cramped with 
iron, and lined with flints embedded in cement, is the only specimen re- 
maining of the ancient architecture of that city. 

Ephesus, too, is no more ; and the temple of Diana, that according to 
Pliny was 220 years in building, and upon which was lavished the talent 
and treasure of the east; the pride of all Asia, and one of the wonders 
of the world, has vanished; while the fountains which furnished the citi- 
zens with water, remain as fresh and perfect as ever. And as a tremen- 
dous satire on all human grandeur, it may be remarked, that a few solitary 
marble sarcophagi, which once enclosed the mighty dead of Ephesus, 
have been preserved — but as ivatering troughs for cattle /* Cisterns have 
been discovered in the oldest citadels of Greece. The fountains of 
JBounarhashi are perhaps the only objects remaining, that can be relied on, 
in locating the palace of Priam and the site of ancient Troy. And the 
well near the outer walls of the temple of the sun at Palmyra, will, in 
all probability, furnish men with water, when other relics of Tadmor in 
the wilderness have disappeared. b 

To conclude, a great number of the wells of the ancient world still 
supply man with water, although their history generally, is lost in the 
night of time. 

* Mr. Addison, in his journey southward from Damascus, says the fountain at Nazcra, 
in Gallilee, "trickles from a spout into a marble trough, which appears to have been 
an ancient sarcophagus." And close by the well at Mizra, he observed fragments of an- 
other, which had been used for a similar purpose. We may add, that Speed, the old 
English historian, remarks that the stone coffin of Richard 3d, " is now made a drinking 
trough for horses at a common Inn." Edition of 1615, p. 737. 

b Lord Lindsay's Letters, (10.) — Phil. Trans. Lowthorp's Abridg. iii, 490. 



50 Wells, among the Antiquities of America. [Book I. 

ANCIENT AMERICAN WELLS. 

As wells are among the most ancient of man's labors, that are extant 
in the old world, might we not expect to find some on these continents, 
relics of those races, who, in the unknown depths of time, are supposed 
to have cultivated the arts of civilization here ] We might : and true it is 
that among the proofs that a populous and much more enlightened people 
than the Indians have ever been, were at one time the possessors of Ame- 
rica, ancient wells have been adduced. "From the highest point of the 
Ohio, says Mr. T. Flint, to where I am now writing (St. Charles on the 
Missouri) and far up the upper Mississippi and Missouri, the more the 
country is explored and peopled, and the more its surface is penetrated, 
not only are there more mounds brought to view, but more incontestible 
marks of a numerous population. Wells, artificially walled, dif- 
ferent structures of convenience or defence, have been found in such num- 
bers, as no longer to excite curiosity" 

But American antiquities were so novel, so unlooked for, and so insu- 
lated from those of the old world, that learned men were greatly per- 
plexed at their appearance ; and at a loss to account for their origin. This 
is still, in a great measure, the case. A mystery, hitherto impenetrable, 
hangs over the primeval inhabitants of these continents. Who they were, 
and whence they came, are problems that have hitherto defied all the re- 
searches of antiquarians. Nothing, perhaps, but the increasing occupa- 
tion of the soil, and excavations which civilization induces, will eventually 
determine the question, whether these antiquities are to be attributed to 
European settlers of the sixteenth century; to the enterprising Scandina- 
vians, the North Men, who, centuries before the voyages of Columbus and 
the Cabots, visited the shores of New England, New York and the 
Jerseys ; or whether some of them did not belong to an indigenous or 
Cuthite race, who inhabited those prolific regions, in times when the 
mastodon and mammoth and megalonix were yet in the land. 

No one can reflect on the myriads of our species who have occupied 
this half of the globe — perhaps from times anterior to the flood — without 
longing to know something of their history ; of their physical and intel- 
lectual condition ; their languages, manners and arts ; of the revolutions 
through which they passed ; and especially of those circumstances which 
caused them to disappear before the progenitors of the present red men. 
The subject is one of the most interesting that ever exercised the human 
mind. It is calculated to excite the most thrilling sensations, and we 
have often expressed our surprise, that one of the most obvious and pro- 
mising sources of information has never been sufficiently investigated : 
we allude to ancient wells, a close examination of ivhich, might lead to 
discoveries equally interesting, and far more important, than those which 
resulted from a similar examination of Grecian wells. Dr. CJarke says, 
that "Vases of Terra Cotta, of the highest antiquity, have been found in 
cleansing the wells of Athens. " a 

Some persons may perhaps suppose the old wells in the western parts 
of this continent, to be the work of Indians ; but these people have never 
been known to make any thing like a regular well. Mr. Catlin, the artist, 

a A Roman well was discovered in the seventeenth century, near the great road 
which leads to Carlisle, in England. Instead of being walled up with stone, it was 
lined with large casks or hogsheads, six feet deep, and made of pine. The well was 
covered with oak plank nine inches thick. In it were found urns, drinking cups, san- 
dals and shoes, the soles of which were stitched and nailed. Phil. Trans. Lowthorp'a 
Abridg. iii, 431. 



Chap. 8.j Ancient Modes of raising Water. 51 

who spent eight years among those on the upper waters of the Missis- 
sippi and Missouri, and another gentleman who had long been east of the 
Rocky mountains, among the Flat Heads, and other tribes towards the 
Pacific, both inform us that the wild and untutored Indians never have 
recourse to wells. They in fact have no need of them, as their villages 
are invariably located on the borders or vicinity of rivers. In some cases 
of suffering from thirst while traveling, they, in common with other sava- 
ges, sometimes scrape a hole in sand or wet soil, to obtain a temporary 
supply. 



CHAP TER VIII. 

Ancient methods of raising water from wells : Inclined planes — Stairs within wells : In Mesopotamia 
—Abyssinia— Hindostan— Persia— Judea— Greece— Thrace— England— Cord and bucket : Used at Ja- 
cob's well — by the patriarchs — Mahomet— In Palestine— India — Alexandria— Arabian Vizier drawing wa- 
ter— Gaza— Herculaneum and Pompeii — Wells within the bouses of the latter city — Aleppo — Tyre — 
Carthage — Cleanthes the 'Well Drawer' of Athens, and successor of Zeno — Democritus — Plautus — As- 
clepiadoe and Menedemus— Cistern pole — Roman cisterns and cement — Ancient modes of purifying 
water. 

We are now to examine the modes practised by the ancients, in ob- 
taining water from wells. When the first simple excavations became so 
far deepened, that the water could no longer be reached by a vessel in 
the hand, some mode of readily procuring it under such circumstances 
would soon be devised. In all cases of moderate depth, the most simple 
and efficient, was to form an inclined plane or passage, from the surface 
of the ground to that of the water ; a device by which the principal ad- 
vatages of an open spring on the surface were retained, and one by which 
domestic animals could procure water for themselves without the aid or 
attendance of man. There is reason to believe that this was one of the 
primitive methods of obtaining the liquid, when it was but a short dis- 
tance below the surface of the ground ; and was most likely impercep- 
tibly introduced by the gradual deepening of, or enlarging the cavities of 
natural springs, or artificial excavations. 

But when in process of time, these became too deep for exterior pas- 
sages of this kind to be convenient or practicable, the wells themselves 
were enlarged, and stairs or steps for descending to the water, constructed 
loitliin them. The circumstances recorded in Grenesis, xxiv, induce us to 
believe that the well at which Eliezer, the steward of Abraham, met Re- 
becca, was one of these. When the former arrived at Nahor, he made 
his camels " to kneel down without the city by a well of water, at the 
time of the evening that women go out to draw water : and Rebecca 
came out with her pitcher upon her shoulder — and she went down to the 
well, and filled her pitcher and came it])." Had any machine been attached 
to this well, to raise its water, or had a vessel suspended to a cord been 
used, she could have had no occasion to descend. It therefore appears 
that the liquid was obtained by immersing the pitcher in it, and in order 
to do this, the persons ' went down' to the water. That this well was 
not deep, may be inferred from the fact that Rebecca drew water suffi- 
cient to quench the thirst of ten camels, for it is said, she supplied them, 
" till they had done drinking ;" a task which no young female could have 
accomplished in the time implied in the text, if this well had been even 



52 Wells with Stairs. [Book I. 

moderately deep, and one which under all circumstances was a laborious 
performance ; for these animals take a prodigious quantity of water at 
a time, sufficient to last them from ten to twenty days. Eliezer might 
well wonder at the ingenuous and benevolent disposition of Rebecca, and 
every reader of the account is equally surprised at his insensibilty, in per- 
mitting her to perform the labor unaided by himself or his attendants. 

Wells with stairs by which to descend to the water, are still common. 
The inhabitants of Arkeko in Abyssinia, are supplied with water from six 
wells, which are twenty feet deep and fifteen in diameter. The water 
is collected and carried uy a broken ascent by men, women and children. 3 
Fryer in his Travels in India, p. 410, speaks of " deep wells many fathom 
under ground with stately stone stairs." Joseph's well in Egypt is ano- 
ther example of stairs both within and without. Bishop Heber observed 
one in Benares, with a tower over it, and a " steep flight of steps for de- 
scending to the water." Forrest, in his Tour along the Ganges and the 
Jumna, says, "near the village of Futtehpore, is a large well, ninety feet 
in circumference, with a broad stone staircase to descend to the water, 
which might be about thirty feet." Mr. Forbes, in his Oriental Memoirs, 
remarks that " many of the Guzzerat wells, have steps leading down to 
the water ; while others have not." In a preceding page, we quoted a 
passage from Ward's History of the Hindoos to the same effect. Ta- 
vernier, speaking of the scarcity of water in Persia, says, of wells they 
have a great many, and he describes one with steps down to the water. b 
" We passed a large and well built tank, with two flights of steps de- 
scending into it, at the opposite angles, possibly the pool of Hebron, where 
David hanged the murderers of Ishbosheth." c The fountain of Siloam 
is reached by a descent of thirty steps cut in the solid rock. 

The small quantity of water furnished by some wells, rendered a de- 
scent to it desirable, and hence it was often collected as fast as it appeared, 
by women who often waited for that purpose. " That which pleased me 
most of all," says Fryer, p. 126, " was a sudden surprise, when they 
brought me to the wrong side of a pretty square tank or well, with a wall 
of stone breast high; when expecting to find it covered with water, 
looking down five fathom deep, I saw - a clutter of women, very handsome, 
waiting the distilling of the water from its dewy sides, which they catch 
in jars. It is cut out of a black marble rock, up almost to the top, with 
broad steps to go down. Mr. Addison in his ' Journey Southward from 
Damascus,' says, " at the fountain near D'jenneen, the women used their 
hands as ladles to fill their pitchers. This scarcity of water, and the prac- 
tice of scooping it up in small quantities, are referred to, by both sacred 
and profane authors. " They came to the pits and found no water, they 
returned with their vessels empty." Jer. xiv, 3. " There shall not be 
found of it a sherd, [a potter's vessel,] to take fire from the hearth, or to 
take water out of the pit," — that is, to scoop it up when too shallow to 
immerse a vase or pitcher in it. Isaiah, hi, 14. St. Peter speaks of wells 
1 without water,' and Hosea, of ' fountains dried up.' 

The water nymphs lament their empty urns." Ovid, Met. ii, 278. 
The inhabitants of Libya, where the wells often contain little water, 
" draw it out in little buckets, made of the shank bones of the camel. d " 

Wells with stairs are not only of very remote origin, but they appear 
to have been used by all the nations of antiquity. They were common 
among the Greeks and Romans. e The well mentioned by Pausanias, of 

a Ed. Encyc. Art. Arkeko. b Persian Trav. 157. c Lindsay's Trav. Let. 9. 
d Ogilvy's Africa, 306. e Lardner's Arts of the Greeks aud Romans, i, 138. 



Chap. 8.] 



Cord and Bucket. 



53 



which we have spoken in a previous chapter, has steps which lead down 
to the water.* The well for the purification of worshippers, in the tem- 
ple of Isis, in Pompeii, has a descent by steps to the water. b The wells 
of Thrace, had generally a covered flight of steps. Ancient wells of 
similar construction are still to be seen in various parts of Europe. There 
is one near Hempstead, Eng. for the protection of which, an act of par- 
liament was passed in the reign of Henry VIII. 

Such wells, probably gave rise to the beautiful circular stairs so com- 
mon in old towers, and still known, as ' well stairs.' 

In Gralveston, (Texas,) and other parts of America, where there are no 
springs, cisterns are sunk in the sand between hillocks, into 'which the 
surface water drains, and steps are formed to lead down to it. 



CORD AND BUCKET. 





No. 8. Modern Greek female drawing water. 



No. 9. From a manuscript of the 12th century. 



However old and numerous wells with stairs within them may be, 
most of the ancient ones were constructed without them ; hence the ne- 
cessity of some mode of raising the water. From the earliest ages, a 
vessel suspended to a cord, has been used by all nations — a device more 
simple and more extensively employed than any other, and one which was 
undoubtedly the germ of the most useful hydraulic machines of the an- 
cients, as the chain of pots, chain pump, &c. That a cord and bucket 
were used to raise water from Jacob's well, nineteen centuries ago, is 
evident from the account of the interview, which the Savior had with the 
woman of Samaria at it. " Then cometh he to a city of Samaria, called 
Sichar ; now Jacob's well was there, and Jesus being wearied sat on the 
well ; and there cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water ; Jesus saith 
unto her, give me to drink." Had any machine been attached to this well 
at that time, by which a traveler or stranger could raise 'it, he could have 
procured it for himself; and as he was thirsty, he probably would have 
done so, without waiting for any one to draw it for him ; but the reason 
why he did not, is subsequently explained by the woman herself; who, 
in replying to one of his remarks, the meaning of which she misappre- 
hended, said " Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep." 
This well, as already remarked, is one hundred and live feet deep. Hence 
at that period every one carried the means of raising the water with him. 
No. 9. of the illustrations, is a representation of the woman of Samaria 
drawing water. It is from a Greek illuminated manuscript of the 12th 
century, from D'Agincourt's Storia DelPArte. 

It is still the general practice in the east, for any one, who goes to 



For. Top. 196. b Pompeii, i, 277. c Hydraulia, 166. 



54 Cord and Bucket. [Book I 

draw water, to carry a vessel and cord with him, a custom which without 
doubt, has prevailed there since the patriarchal ages. This was the 
opinion of Mahomet, whose testimony on such a subject is unexceptiona- 
ble. He was an Arab — a people who pride themselves on the preserva- 
tion of the customs of their celebrated ancestors, Abraham, Ishmael, and 
Job. In his account of Joseph's deliverance from the pit, into which his 
brethren had cast him, (and which many commentators believe was a 
well, which at the time contained little or no water,) he says : " Certain 
travelers came, and sent one to draw water, (who went to the well in 
which Joseph was,) and he let down his bucket/' &c. Koran, chap. xii. 
This account is perfectly consistent with that of Moses. Josephus, also, 
seems to have believed it to be a well : " Reubel took the lad and tied 
him to a cord, and let him down gently into the pit, for it had no water 
in it." Antiq. B. ii. 3. 

At 3 o'clock, (says Mr. Addison in his "Journey Southward from 
Damascus") we rode to a well (in approaching Cana of Galilee) in a 
field, where an Arab was watering his goats. There was a long stone 
trough by the side of the well, and this was filled with water by means 
of a leathern bucket attached to a rope, which the Arab carried about 
with him, for the convenience of himself and his herds. It was just such 
a scene as that described in Genesis : " And behold a well in the field, and 
lo, there were three flocks of sheep lying by it, for out of that well they 
watered their flocks, and a great stone was upon the well's mouth." 
Among the ruins of Mizra, in the great plain of Jezreel, the same traveler 
observes : " Surprised at the desolate aspect of the spot, I rode with my 
servant to a well a few yards distant, where two solitary men were 
watering their goats, by means of a leathern bucket attached to a rope ; 
and dismounting, I sat on the stone at the well's mouth.' , Mr. Forbes, 
after a residence of many years in Asia, said he " did not recollect any 
wells furnished with buckets and ropes for the convenience of strangers ; 
most travelers are therefore provided with them ; and halcarras and reli- 
gious pilgrims frequently carry a small brass pot affixed to a long string 
for this purpose." 

In ancient Alexandria, where the arts were cultivated and science 
flourished to an extent perhaps unequaled in any older city, water was 
drawn up from the cisterns, with which every house was provided, with 
the simple cord and bucket. This city was supplied with water from the 
Nile : it was admitted into vaulted reservoirs or cisterns, which were 
constructed at the time the foundations of the city were laid by Alexander. 
They were sufficiently capacious to contain water for a whole year, being 
filled only at the annual inundation of the river, through a canal made for 
the purpose. Apertures or well openings, through which the water was 
raised from these reservoirs, are still to be seen. " Whole lines of ancient 
streets are traceable," (says Lord Lindsay, Travels, Letter 2.) " by the 
wells recurring every six or seven yards : by which the contiguous houses, 
long since crumbled away, drew water from the vast cisterns with which 
the whole city was undermined." 

" Every house," says Rollin, "had an opening into its cistern, like the 
mouth of a well, through which the water was taken up either in buckets 
or pitchers." It may be said, this last quotation is not conclusive, since 
it does not indicate the manner in which the bucket was elevated — by a 
windlass 1 a pulley 1 or by the hand alone ] We have satisfactory evi- 
dence that it was by the latter. The pavement of the old city is from ten 
to thirty feet below the surface of the modern streets, and excavations are 
frequently made by the Pasha's workmen, for the stones of the old pave- 



Chapt. 8.] Cord and Bucket. 55 

ment and of the buildings. In this manner the marble mouths of the 
. vaulted reservoirs or cisterns are frequently brought to light ; St. John's 
E o-ypt, vol. i. 8 : and they invariably exhibit traces of the ropes used for 
raising the water. Grooves are found worn in them, (by the ropes) to the 
depth of two inches, and such grooves are often numerous in each curb or 
mouth. Dry wells are built over some of these, and continued to the 
level of the present streets. Through them the inhabitants still draw 
water from the ancient reservoirs ; and in the same manner as it was 
raised from them when the Ptolemies ruled over the land. A person in 
raising the bucket, stands at a short distance from the curb or mouth, and 
pulls the rope horizontally, or nearly so, towards him. In this way, the 
rope rubs against the top and inside of the curb, and in time wears deep 
grooves in it, such as are found in the ancient ones just mentioned. 
Sometimes, in order to avoid the friction, and consequent loss of power 
and wear of the ropes, the person drawing would stand on the edge of the 
curb, so as to keep the cord clear ; but the practice is too perilous ever to 
have been general. It is, however, practised occasionally by the 
Hindoos. 

El Makin, the Arabian historian, says that Moclach, the Vizier of Rhadi, 
who was deprived of his right liand and his tongue, and was confined in 
a lower room of the palace, where was a well ; and having no person to 
attend him, he drew water for himself, pulling the rope with his left hand, 
and stopping it with his teeth, till the bucket came within his reach." 
This was in the tenth century. Martigny's History of the Arabians, vol. 
iv. 7. The wells on the road to Gaza, noticed by Mr. Stephens, had their 
upper surfaces formed of marble, which he observes had many grooves 
cut in it, " apparently being worn by the long continued use of ropes in 
drawing water." Incidents of Travel, vol. ii. 102. 

That the same mode of raising it was adopted in the public wells of the 
ancient cities of Greece and Rome, is evident from those of Herculaneum 
and Pompeii ; and from discoveries made in the latter city, it is obvious 
that it was practised in obtaining water from the wells and cisterns of 
private houses. This is a very interesting fact in connection with our 
subject, as it shows conclusively that the pump, if used at all by the Ro- 
mans in their private houses, it was only to a very limited extent. In 
1834, besides theatres, baths, temples and other public buildings, eighty 
houses had been disinterred. These were found to be almost uniformly 
provided with cisterns, built under ground and cemented, for the collection 
of rain-water. Each of these has an opening, enclosed in a curb, through 
which the water was drawn up. These are generally formed of a white 
calcareous stone, on which are to be seen deep channels, (Pompeii, vol. i. 
88,) like those on the mouths of the Alexandrian cisterns, and produced 
from the same cause — the friction of the ropes used in drawing the water. 
The hypgethrum, says Sir William Gell, in his description of the house 
of the Dioscuri, in this case served as a compluvium ; receiving the water 
which fell from the roof, and transmitting it to a reservoir below, to which 
there is a marble mouth or puteal, exhibiting the traces of long use, in the 
furrows vjorn by the ropes, by which the water was drawn up. Pompei- 
ana, vol. ii, 27. 

The great variety of 'buildings to which wells and cisterns having their 
curbs thus worn were attached, show that this mode of raising water was 
nearly universal in Pompeii. The simple cord and bucket was equally 
used in the palace of the quasstor, and the humble dwelling of the private 
citizen. It was by them, the priests drew water for the uses of the 
temples, and mechanics for various purposes in the arts. Bakers thus 



56 Card and Bucket. [Book I, 

raised water for their kneading-troughs, from cisterns or wells under thp 
floor of their shops. Three bakers' shops, at least, have been found, and 
all of them in a tolerable state of preservation : their mills, ovens, knead- 
ing troughs, flour, loaves of bread, (with their quality, or the bakers' 
names stamped on them,) leaven, vessels for containing water, and their re- 
servoirs of the latter, &c. have been discovered, so as to leave almost 
nothing wanting to perfect our knowledge of this art among the Romans. 
It is probable that wells were not infrequent in the interior of the houses 
in Pompeii, for another one was discovered in the house of a medical 
man, as presumed from cliirurgical instruments found in it. a 

The custom of Roman bakers having wells or cisterns within their 
houses, continued to modern times. When the Royal Academy of Sci- 
ences of France, undertook in the last century, the noble task of pub- 
lishing a detailed account of all the useful arts, with a view to their uni- 
versal diffusion and perpetuity — the baker is represented drawing water 
from a well, under the floor of his shop, and in a manner analagous to 
that practised by his predecessors of Pompeii. b London bakers also had 
wells in their cellars, for the same purpose, and probably still have them 
to some extent. 

The inhabitants of the city of Aleppo/i the metropolis of Syria, drew 
water from their cisterns or subterraneous reservoirs, and also from their 
wells, with which ' almost every house'* was provided, with a cord and 
bucket, in the same manner as the Egyptians of Alexandria ; and so do 
the inhabitants of Soor, which occupies the site of ancient Tyre, a town 
which contained in 1816, according to Mr. Buckingham, eight hundred 
stone built houses, most of which, he observes, had wells. Ancient Car- 
thage "was built like Alexandria, upon cisterns — a common practice of 
old. The modern inhabitants of Arzew, the ancient Arsenaria, as observed 
by Dr. Shaw in his Travels, dwell in the old cisterns, as in so many ho- 
vels; the water from which, was doubtless drawn in former times, by the 
simple cord and bucket — the universal implements still used throughout 
Egypt, Palestine, Syria, Asia Minor, Persia, Hindostan, and generally 
through all the east. This primeval device for raising water, has been 
used in all ages, and will doubtless continue to be so used, to the end of 
time. 

An interesting circumstance is recorded, respecting an individual, who, 
from his occupation in ancient Athens, was named the ' Well-Drawer,' 
which may here be noticed. This was Clean thes, a native of Lydia, who 
went to Athens as a wrestler, about 300 B. C. and acquiring a taste for 
philosophy there, determined to place himself under the tuition of some 
eminent philosopher, although he possessed no more than four drachmce, 
or sixty-two cents ! He became a disciple of Zeno, and that he might have 
leisure to attend the schools of philosophy in the day-time, he drew water by 
night, as a common laborer in the public gardens. For several years he was 
so very poor, that he wrote the heads of his master's lectures, on bones 
and shells, for want of money to buy better materials : at last, some Athe- 
nian citizens observing, that though he appeared strong and healthy, he 
had no visible means of subsistence, summoned him before the Areopagus, 
according to a law borrowed from the Egyptians, to give an account of 
his manner of living. Upon this, he produced the gardener for whom he 
drew water, and a woman for whom he ground meal, as witnesses to 
prove that he subsisted by the labor of his hands. The judges, we are 

a Lardner's Arts, &c. i, 268. b Descriptions des Arts et Metiers. Paris, 1761. Art du 
Boulanger. Planche 5. c Russel's History of Aleppo, p. 7. 



Chap. 8.] 



Cistern Pole. 



57 



told, were so much struck with admiration of his conduct, that they or- 
dered ten mince, [one hundred and sixty dollars] to be paid him out of the 
public treasury. 

The conduct of Cleanthes explains the secret of the great celebrity of 
many ancient philosophers, and shows the only means by which eminence 
in any department of human knowledge can be acquired : viz. by industry 
and perseverance. Besides his poverty, which of itself was sufficient to 
paralyze the efforts of most men, he was so singularly dull in apprehen- 
sion, that his fellow disciples used to call him the ass ; but resolution and 
application raised him above them all, made him a complete master of 
the stoic philosophy, and qualified him as successor of the illustrious Zeno. 
Democritus beautifully expressed the same sentiment, by representing 
Truth as hid in the bottom of a well ; to intimate the difficulty with which 
she is found. 

Analogous to the conduct of Cleanthes, was that of Plautus, the poet, 
who being reduced from competence to the meanest poverty, hired him- 
self to a baker as a common laborer, and while employed in grinding 
corn, exercised his mind in study. The same may be remarked of Ascle- 
piades and Menedemus, two Grecian philosophers, who were both so 
poor, that at one period, they hired themselves as bricklayer's laborers, 
and were employed in carrying mortar to the tops of buildings. Ascle- 
piades, was not ashamed to be seen thus engaged, but his companion "hid 
himself if he saw any one passing by." Athenceus, says they were at 
one time summoned, like Cleanthes, before the Areopagites, to account 
for their manner of living — when they requested a miller to be sent for, 
who testified that " they came every night to his mill, where they labored 
and gained two drachmae." 

No. 8, in the last engraving, represents a modern Greek female drawing 
water. It is from a sketch of Capo D'Istrias' house. See the Westminster 
Review for September, 1838. 




No. 10. Cistern Pole 



CISTERN POLE. 

This simple implement, may be thought too in- 
significant to deserve a particular notice, but as it 
is extensively used in our rain-water cisterns, and 
is no modern device, we are unwilling to pass it. 
It was known to the Romans. Pliny expressly 
mentions it, when speaking of various modes of 
watering gardens. He says water is drawn from 
a well or tank, "by plain poles, hooks and buckets," 
B. xix, 4 ; and that it was a domestic implement in 
old times as at present, in raising water from 
cisterns, is proved by the discovery of some of 
the hooks at Pompeii. Lard. Arts, &c. i, 205. 
Having mentioned the rain water cisterns of the 
Romans, it may be observed, that they were as 
j^gj B common in Pompeii as they are in this city, every 
house having been furnished with one. 

As Pliny's account of these cisterns may be 
useful to some mechanics, especially masons, we 
shall make no apology for inserting it. " The 
walls were lined with strong cement, formed of 
five parts of sharp sand, and two of quicklime 
mixed with flints ; the bottom being paved with 



58 The Pulley. [Book I 

the same, and well beaten with an iron rammer." B. xxxvi, 23. Holland's 
Trans. The composition of this cement, differs from that which Dr. 
Shaw says has been used in modern times in the east ; and which he 
thinks is the same as that of the ancients. He says the cisterns which 
were built by Sultan ben Eglib, in several parts of the kingdom of Tunis, 
are equal in solidity with the famous ones at Carthage, continuing to this 
day (unless where they been designedly broken,) as firm and compact, 
as if they were just finished. The composition is made in this manner: 
they take two parts of wood ashes, three of lime, and one of fine sand, 
which after being well sifted and mixed together, they beat for three 
days and nights incessantly with wooden mallets, sprinkling them alter- 
nately and at proper times, with a little oil and water, till they become 
of a due consistence. This composition is chiefly used in their arches, 
cisterns and terraces. But the pipes of their aqueducts, are joined by 
beating tow and lime together, with oil only, without any mixture of water. 
Both these compositions quickly assume the hardness of stone, and suffer no 
water to pervade them. Trav. 286. 

If the Romans wished to have water perfectly pure, they made two 
and sometimes three cisterns, at different levels ; so that the water suc- 
cessively deposited the impurities with which it might be charged. 
From this, we see that the recent introduction of two cisterns for the 
same purpose, in some of our best houses, is a pretty old contrivance. 
It in fact dates far beyond the Roman era. The famous cisterns of So- 
lomon are examples of it. Rain-water was frequently boiled by the Ro- 
mans before they used it. Pliny xxxi, 3. This was also an ancient prac- 
tice among older nations. Herodotus, says the water of the Choaspes, 
which was drunk by the Persian kings, was previously boiled, and kept 
in vessels of silver. B. i, 188. 



CHAPTER IX. 

The Pulley: Its origin unknown — Used in the erection of ancient buildings and in ships — Ancient one 
found in Egypt — Probably first used to raise water — Not extensively used in ancient Grecian wells : Cause 
of this — Used in Mecca and Japan — Led to the employment of animals to raise water — Simple mode of 
adapting them to this purpose, in the east. Pulley and two buckets : Used by the Anglo Saxons, Nor- 
naans, &c. — Italian mode of raising water to upper floors — Desagulier's mode — Self-acting, or gaining 
and losing buckets — Marquis of Worcester — Heron of Alexandria — Robert Fludd — Lever bucket engine 
— Bucket of Bologna — Materials of ancient buckets. 

PULLEY AND SINGLE BUCKET. 

We now come to the period when some of the simple machines, or 
mechanical powers, as they are improperly named, were applied to raise 
water. When this first took place, is unknown : That it was at an early 
stage in the progress of the arts, few persons will doubt ; but the time is 
as uncertain, as that of the invention of those admirable contrivances 
for transmitting and modifying forces. It was among the devices by 
which the famous structures of antiquity were raised; and Egyptian en- 
gineers under the Pharaohs, were undoubtedly acquainted with all the 
combinations of it now known. Had Vitruvius neither described it, nor 
mentioned its applications, a circumstance which occurred at the close of 
Cleopatra's life, would have sufficiently proved its general use, in the 
erection of elevated buildings under the Ptolemies. The Egyptian queen, 



Chap. 9.] 



Pulley and Single Bucket. 



59 



to avoid falling into the hands of Octavius, took refuge in a very high 
tower, accessible only from above. Into this, she and her two maids, 
drew up Antony, (who had given himself a fatal wound,) by means of 
ropes and pullies, which happened to be there, for the purpose of raising 
stones to the top of the building. But the pulley was an essential re- 
quisite in the sailing vessels of Egypt, India and China, in the remotest 
ages. Neither trading ships, nor the war fleets of Sesostris, or previous 
warriors, could have traversed the Indian ocean without this appendage to 
raise and lower the sails, or quickly to regulate their movements by hal- 
liards. The ancient Egyptians, says Mr. Wilkinson, " were not ignorant 
of the pulley." The remains of one have actually been disinterred, and 
are now preserved in the museum of Leyden. The sides are of athul 
or tamarisk wood, the roller of fir : part of the rope made of leef or fibres 
of the date tree, was found at the same time. This relic of former times, 
is supposed to have been used in drawing water from a well. Its date is 
uncertain. 

There are reasons which render it probable that the single pulley, was 
devised to raise water and earth from wells, and probability is all that can 
ever be attained with regard to its origin. But may not the pulley have 
been known before wells % We think not, and for the following reasons : 
1. Most barbarous people have been found in possession of some of the 
latter, but not of the former ; and in the infancy of the arts, man has in 
all ages, had recourse to the same expedients, and in the same order. 2. 
Wells are not only of the highest antiquity, but they are the only known 
works of man in early times, in which the pulley could have been re- 
quired or applied. 3. The importance of water in those parts of Asia 
where the former generations of men dwelt, must have urged them at an 
early period to facilitate by the pulley, the labor of raising it. That it 
preceded the invention of ships, and the erection of lofty buildings of stone, 
is all but certain ; but for what purpose, except for raising water, the pul- 
ley could have previously been required, it would be difficult to divine. 
It seems to have been the first addition made to those primitive imple- 
ments, the cord and bucket ; and when once adopted, it naturally led, as 
we shall find in the sequel, to the most valuable machine which the an- 
cients employed. By it the friction of the rope 
in rubbing against the curb, and the consequent 
V/j/ A\ loss of a portion of the power expended in raising 

the water, were avoided, and by it also a beneficial 
change in the direction of the power, was attained : 
instead of being exerted in an ascending direction, 
as in Nos. 8 and 9, it is applied more conveniently 
and efficiently in a descending one, as in the figure. 
Notwithstanding the obvious advantages of using 
the pulley, it would appear that it was not exten- 
sively used in the public wells of the ancients, ex- 
cept in those from which the water was raised by 
oxen. No example of its use has occurred in the 
No. 11. Pulley and Bucket, wells of Herculaneum or Pompeii. Nor does it 
appear to have been employed to any great extent 
by the Greeks ; for with them, a vessel by which to draw water, was as 
necessary a utensil to their mendicants, as to the modern pilgrims and fa- 
kirs of Asia. The poorest of beggars, Aristophanes' Telepheus, had a 
staff, a broken cup, and a bucket, although it leaked. This custom there- 
fore of carrying a vessel, and cord to draw water, shows that no per- 
manent one was attached to their public wells, which would have been 




60 Pulley and Bucket. [Book I. 

the case had the pulley been used. If such had been the custom, nei- 
ther the mendicant Telepheus, nor Diogenes the philosopher, would have 
carried about with them, vessels for the purpose. 

It is not easy to account for the partial rejection of the pulley by the 
Greeks in raising water, when its introduction would have materially di 
minished human labor. It certainly did not arise from ignorance of its 
advantages, as their constant application of it to other purposes, attests ; 
and there is reason to believe, they adopted it to some extent in raising 
water from the holds of their ships, in common with the maritime people 
of Asia. It was indeed used in some of their wells, a but only to a limi- 
ted extent. The principal reason for not employing it in public wells, was 
probably this — With it, a single person only could draw water at a time, 
while without it, numbers could lower and raise their vessels simulta- 
neously, without interfering with each other. In the former case, alter- 
cations would be frequent and unavoidable ; and the inconvenience of 
numbers of people waiting for water in warm climates a serious evil. The 
rich, and those who had servants would always procure it, while the poor 
and such as had no leisure, would obtain it with difficulty. The large di- 
ameter of their wells and those of other nations, it would seem, was solely 
designed to accommodate several people at the same time. These rea- 
sons it is admitted, do not apply to the private wells and cisterns of the 
Greeks and Romans, in which the pulley might have been used ; but 
those people followed the practice of older nations, and from the great 
number of their slaves, (who drew the water) they had no inducement or 
disposition to lessen their labor. 

A bucket suspended over a pulley, is still extensively used in raising" 
water from wells throughout the world. The Arabians use it at the well 
Zemzem ; the mouth of which, is " surrounded by a brim of fine white 
marble five feet high, and ten feet in diameter ; upon this the persons 
stand, who draw water in leathern buckets, attached to pulleys, an iron 
railing being so placed as to prevent their falling in." b 

Apparatus precisely similar to the figure in No. 11, are used by the Ja- 
panese and other Asiatics. Montanus' Japan. 294. 

The pulley has but recently given place to pumps, in workshops and 
dwellings, and in these only to a limited extent — being confined chiefly to a 
few cities in the United States and Europe. In France and England, it was 
a common appendage to wells in the interior of houses, during the last 
century ; and in such cases it is still extensively used throughout Spain, 
Portugal and other parts of Europe. It is very common in this country, 
and also in South America. 

But the grand advantage of the pulley in the early ages was this ; — by 
it the vertical direction in which men exerted their strength, could be di- 
rectly changed into a horizontal one, by which change, animals could be 
employed in place of men. The wells of Asia, frequently varying from 
two to three, and even four hundred feet in depth, obviously required 
more than one person to raise the contents of an ordinary sized vessel : and 
where numbers of people depended on such wells, not merely to sup- 
ply their domestic wants, but for the purposes of irrigation, the substi- 
tution of animals in place of men, to raise water, became a matter almost 
of necessity, and was certainly adopted at a very early period. In em- 
ploying an ox for this purpose, the simplest way, and one which deviated 
the least from their accustomed method, was merely to attach the end of 
the rope to the yoke, after passing it over a pulley fixed sufficiently 



Gardner's Arts, &c i, 138. »»Crichton's Arabia, ii, 219. 



Chap. 9] 



Application of Animals to Raise Water. 



61 



high above the mouth of the well, and then driving the animal in a direct 
line from it, and to a distance equal to its depth, when the bucket charged 
with the liquid would be raised from the bottom. This, the most direct 
and efficient, was, (it is believed,) the identical mode adopted, and like 
other devices of the ancients, it is still continued by their descendants in 
Africa and Asia. Its value in the estimation of the moderns, may be 
learned from the fact, that it is adopted in this and other cities for raising 
coals, &c. from the holds of ships ; for which and similar purposes, it has 
been in use for ages in Europe. It has also been used to work pumps, 
the further end of the rope being attached to a heavy piston working In 
a very long chamber or cylinder. 




No. 12. Ancient and Modern method of raising water in Asia. 

This was probably one of the first operations, and certainly one of the 
most obvious, where human labor was superseded by that of animals, and 
in accomplishing it, the pulley itself was perhaps discovered. This mode 
is common in Egypt, Arabia, India — through all Hindostan, and various 
other parts of the east. Mr. Elphinstone mentions a large well under the 
walls of the fort at Bikaneer, from fifteen to twenty-two feet in diameter, 
and three hundred feet deep. In this well four large buckets are used, 
each thus drawn up by a pair of oxen, and all worked at the same time. 
When any one of them was let down, "its striking the water, made a 
noise like a great gun." But simple as this mode of raising water by animal 
is, it is capable of an improvement equally simple, though not perhaps ob- 
vious to general readers. It was not'however left to modern mechanicians to 
discover, but is one among hundreds of ancient devices, whose origin is 
lost in the remoteness of time. It is this — Instead of the animal receding 
from the well on level ground, it is made to descend an inclined plane, so 
that the weight of its body contributes towards raising the load. This is 
characteristic of Asiatic devices. At a very early period, the principle 
of combining the weiglit of men and animals with their muscular energy, 
in propelling machines, was adopted. We shall meet with other exam- 
ples of it. 



PULLEY AND TWO BUCKETS. 

The addition of another bucket, so as to have one at each end of the 
rope, was the next step in the progress of improvement; and although so 
simple a device may appear too obvious to have remained long unper- 
ceived, and one which required no stretch of intellect to accomplish, it 
was one of no small importance, since it effected what is seldom witnessed 
in practical mechanics — a saving both of time and labor. Thus, by it, 
the empty vessel descended and became filled, as the other was elevated, 



62 



Pulley and Two Buckets. 



[Book I. 



(without the expenditure of any additional time and labor to lower it, as 
with the single bucket,) while its weight in descending, contributed towards 
raising the charged one. 

These advantages were not the only results of the simple addition of 
another bucket; though they were probably all that were anticipated by 
the author at the time. It really imparted a new feature to the apparatus, 
and one which naturally led to the development of that great machine, in 
which terminated all the improvements of the older mechanics on the 
primitive cord and bucket — and to which, modern ingenuity has added — 
nothing — viz: the endless chain of pots- — indeed nothing more was 
then wanting, but to unite the two ends of the rope together, and attach 
a number of vessels to it, at equal distances from each other, through the 
whole of its length, and the machine just named was all but complete. 



/rtTTfTTT\ 




No. 13. Ancient. 
[From sepulchral monuments.] 



No. 14. Modern. 



The Anglo Saxons used two buckets hooped with iron, one at each 
end of a chain which passed over a pulley . a And in the old Norman 
castles, water was raised by the same means. In one of the keeps or towers, 
still remaining, which was built by G-undulph, bishop of Rochester, in 
the reigns of the Conqueror and William Rufus, the mode of elevating 
the water is obvious. " For water, there was a well in the very middle 
of the partition wall: it was also made to go through the whole wall, from 
the bottom of the tower up to the very leads, (i. e. the roof) and on every 
floor were small arches in the wall, forming a communication between 
the pipe of the wall, and the several apartments, so that by a pulley, 
water was communicated every where." And in Newcastle, a similar 
tower exhibits the same device for obtaining the water : " a remarkable 
pillar from which arches branched out very beautifully on each side, in- 
closed a pipe, (that is, the continuation of the well,) which conducted 
water from the well." b It appears to have been, in the middle ages, the 
uniform practice to enclose wells within the walls of towers, that in case 
of sieges, the water might not be cut off. It was the same in early 
Rome : the capitol was supplied by a deep well at the foot of the Tar- 
peian Rock, into which backets were lowered through an artificial groove 
or passage made in the rock. c The double bucket is still used in inns in 
Spain. See a figure in Sat. Mag. Vol. vii, 58. 

A simple mode is practised in Italy, by which a person in the upper story 
of a house, and at some distance from the well or cistern, (which is ge- 
nerally in the court yard,) raises water without being obliged to descend. 

One end of a strong iron rod or wire, is fixed to the house above the 
window of an upper landing or passage, and the other end in the ground, 



a Encyc. Antiq. 524. b Ibid, 82. c Gell's Topography of Rome, ii, 203. . 



Chap. 9.] 



Raising Water to Upper Floors. 



63 



on the farther side of the well and in a line with its centre as in No. 15. 
A ring which slides easily over the wire is secured to the handle of the 
bucket, to which a cord is also attached and passes over a pulley fixed 
above the window. Thus when the cord is slackened, the bucket de- 
scends along the wire into the .water, 
and when filled is drawn up by a per- 
son at the window. (Kitchens in the 
houses of Italy, like those of London 
and Paris are often on the upper floors.) 
'■* This mode of raising water to the up- 
per stories of houses is practised in Ve- 
nice and some other towns in Italy." 8 
We are not acquainted with the origin of 
this device. From the circumstance of 
the ancient, (as well as the modern) in 
habitants of Asia, Greece, Italy, &c. 
having had jets d'eau and tanks of wa- 
ter in the centre of their court-yards, 
it is possible that this mode of raising 
water to the upper floors of dwellings, 
may be of ancient date. It was in use 
in the 16th century, and is described in 
Serviere's collection, from which the 
figure is taken. b In the same work are 
devices for raising water in buckets to 
the tops of buildings by pulleys, ropes, 
&c. moved by water wheels. 

Of modern devices for raising water 
with the pulley and bucket, the most efficient is said to be that of Dr. 
Desaguliers. After passing the rope over a pulley, he suspended to its 
end a frame of wood on which a man could stand — the bucket at the other 
end was made heavier than this frame, and therefore descended of itself. 
The length of the rope was such, that when the bucket was at the bottom, 
the frame was level with the place to which the water was to be raised. 
As soon as the bucket was filled with water, for the admission of which 
a hole was made in its bottom, and covered by a flap or valve, a man, 
whose weight exceeded, (with the frame) that of the bucket and water, 
stepped upon the frame, and sunk down with it to the bottom, and con- 
sequently raised the bucket of water to the required height, when a hook 
catched in a hasp at the side of the bucket, turned it over, and discharged 
its contents into the reservoir. As soon as the bucket was empty, the 
man at the bottom stepped off the frame and ran up a flight of stairs made 
for the purpose, to the place whence he descended ; and in the mean time, 
the bucket being heavier than the frame, descended to the water, and was 
again raised by the same process. 

Such a device is well enough for philosophical experiment, but is cer- 
tainly not adapted for practical purposes. Simple as it may appear, 
there are requisites necessary to its efficient application, which in common 
practice are unattainable. 




No. 15. Italian mode of raising water to the 
upper floors of a house. 



a Cadell's Journey into Carniola, Italy, &c. Edinburgh, 1820, i, 481. 

b Recueil D'Quvrages Curieux de Mathematique et de Mechanique, ou Description 
du Cabinet de M. Grollier de Serviere, avec des figures en taille douce, pai* M. Grol- 
lier de Serviere, son petit fils. A Lyon, 1719. The elder Serviere died in the 17th 
century. 



64 



Self-Acting Buckets. 



[Book I 



SELF-ACTING, OR GAINING AND LOSING BUCKETS. 

In the latter part of the 16th, or beginning of the 17th century, a ma- 
chine for raising water, was in use in Italy, which is entitled to particular 
notice, on account of its being alleged to be the first one of the kind 
which was self-acting ; and in that respect, was the forerunner of the 
motive ' Fire Engine' itself. It appears to have been first described by 
Schottus in his Technia Curiosa. According to Moxon, his description 
was taken from one in actual operation "at a nobleman's house at Basil." 
(Mech. Pow. 107.) But Belidor, says the first one who put such a thing in 
execution, was Gironimo Finugio, at Rome in 1616 ; although Schottus had 
long before contrived an engine for this purpose. Moxon has given a figure 
and description of one, but without naming the source from whence he ob- 
tained it: he says it was "made at Rome, in the convent of St. Maria de 
Victoria : the lesser bucket did contain more than a whole urn of water, 
(at Rome they say un barile,) but before, while they used lesser buckets, 
the engine wanted success." It would seem that it was to one of these 
'Roman Engines,' that the Marquis of Worces- 
ter referred, in the 21st proposition of his Cen- 
tury of Inventions: "How to raise water con- 
stantly with two buckets only, day and night, 
without any other force than its own motion, using 
not so much as any force, wheel or sucker, nor 
more pulleys than one, on which the cord or chain 
rolleth, with a bucket fastened at each end. 
This I confess I have seen and learned of the 
great mathematician Claudius, his studies at 
Rome, he having made a present thereof unto a 
cardinal, and I desire not to own any other men's 
inventions, but if I set down any, to nominate like- 
wise the inventor." 

The machine described by Moxon, is encum- 
bered with too many appendages for popular 
illustration — its essential parts will be under- 
stood by the accompanying diagram, from Ha- 
chette's Traite Elementaire des Machines, Paris, 
1819. Over a pulley S, are suspended two 
vessels A and B, of unequal dimensions. The 
smaller one B, is made heavier than A when both 
are empty, but lighter when they are filled. It 
is required to raise by them, part of the water 
from the spring or reservoir E, into the cistern 
Z. As the smaller bucket B, by its superior 
gravity, descends into E, (a flap or valve in its 
bottom admitting the water,) it consequently 
raises A into the position represented in the 
figure. A pipe F, then conveys water from the 
reservoir into A, the orifice or bore of which 
pipe, is so proportioned, that both vessels are 
filled simultaneously. The larger bucket then pre- 
ponderates, descending to O, and B at the same 
time rising to the upper edge of Z, when the 
projecting pins O O, catch against others on the 
lower sides of the buckets, and overturn them at 
the same moment. The bails or handles are at- 
tached by swivels to the sides, a little above the 




No. 16. 



Gaining and Losing 
Buckets. 



Chap. 9.] Self-A ting Buckets. 65 

centre of gravity. As soon as both vessels are emptied, B again pre- 
ponderates, and the operation is repeated without any attendance, as 
long as there is water in E and the apparatus continues in order. 

In Moxon's machine, the vessels were filled by two separate tubes of 
unequal bore ; the orifices being covered by valves, to prevent the es- 
cape of water while the buckets were in motion ; these valves were 
opened and closed by means of cords attached to the buckets. The efflux 
through F in the figure, may easily be stopped as soon as A begins to de- 
scend, by the action of either bucket on the end of a lever attached to a 
valve, or by other obvious contrivances. The water discharged from A, 
runs to waste through some channel provided for the purpose. These 
machines are of limited application, since they require a fall for the de- 
scent of A, equal to the elevation to which the liquid is raised in B. They 
may however be modified to suit locations where a less descent only can 
be obtained. Thus, by connecting the rope of B to the periphery of a 
large wheel, while that of A is united to a smaller one on the same axis, 
water may be raised higher than the larger bucket falls, but the quantity 
raised, will of course be proportionally diminished. 

In Serviere's Collection, a Gaining and Losing Bucket Machine is de- 
scribed. Another one was invented in 1725, by George Gerves an En- 
glish carpenter, who probably was not aware that he had been anticipated 
by continental mechanics upwards of a century before. He erected one 
in Buckinghamshire, which was much approved of by Sir Isaac Newton, 
Beighton, Desaguliers, Switzer, and others. Mr. Beighton who drew up 
a description of it, observes that it was so free from friction, that "it is 
likely to continue an age without repair;" and Dr. Desaguliers on insert- 
ing an account of it in his Experimental Philosophy, vol. ii, 461, says, 
" this engine has not been out of order since it was first set up, about fif- 
teen years ago." Notwithstanding these favorable testimonials, it has 
fallen into disuse. It was much too complex and cumbersome, and of too 
limited application ever to become popular. 

The principle of self-action in all these machines is no modern discovery,, 
for it was described by Heron of Alexandria, who applied it to the ope- 
ning and closing the doors of a temple, and to other purposes. The mo- 
tive bucket when filled, descended and communicated by a secret cord 
the movement required, and when its contents were discharged (by a si- 
phon similar to the one figured in the Clepsydra of Ctesibius, in our fifth 
book,) it was again raised by a weight at the other end of the cord, like the 
bucket, in the last figure. See De Naturae Simia seu technica macro- 
cosmi historia, by Robert Fludd, (the English Rosicrucian.) Oppenheim, 
1618, pp. 478 and 489, where several similar contrivances are figured — 
hence the device is much older than has been supposed. Perhaps the 
best modification of the ' Gaining and Losing Bucket', is Francini's, a de- 
scription of which may be seen in -our account of the Endless Chain of 
Pots. 

A lever machine described by Dr. Desaguliers may here be noticed. "A A, 
(No. 17,) are two spouts running from a gutter or spring of water, into the 
two buckets D and E. D containing about thirty gallons and being called 
the losing bucket, and E the gaining bucket, containing less than a quarter 
part of D, as for example six gallons. D E, is a lever or beam movable 
about the axis or centre C, which is supported by the pieces F F, be- 
tween which the bucket D can descend when the contrary bucket E is 
raised up, D C, is to C E, as one is to four. G L is an upright piece, 
through the top of which the lever K I moves about the centre L, 
sometimes resting on the prop H, and sometimes raised from it by the 

9 



66 



Lever Bucket Machi? 



[Book I. 



pressure of the arm C E on the end I. The bucket D when empty, has 
its mouth upwards, being suspended as above mentioned. The end D 
with its bucket is also lighter than the end with the bucket E, when both 
are empty. By reason of the different bore of the spouts, D is filled al- 
most as soon as E, and immediately preponderating, sinks down to D, 
and thereby raises the contrary end of the lever and its bucket 
up to the cistern M, into which it discharges its water; but immediately 
the bucket D becoming full, pours out its water, and the end of the lever 
E comes down again into its horizontal situation, and striking upon the 
end I of the loaded lever I K, raises the weight K, by which means the 
force of its blow is broken. If the distance A B or fall of the water be 
about six feet, this machine will raise the water into the cistern M twenty- 
four feet high. Such a machine is very simple and may be made in any 
proportion according to the fall of the water, the quantity allowed to be 
wasted, and the height to which the water must be raised." 




No. 17. Gaining and Losing Buckets. 

"Some years ago," Dr. Desaguliers continues, "a gentleman showed me 
a model of such an engine varying something from this, but so con- 
trived as to stop the running of the water at A A, when the lever D E 
began to move. He told me he had set up an engine in Ireland, which 
raised about half a hogshead of water in a minute, forty feet high, and 
did not cost forty shillings a year to keep it in repair, and that it was not 
very expensive to set up at first." Experimental Philosophy, vol. i, 78. 

There is a singular historical fact connected with the use of buckets to 
raise water from wells, which will serve to conclude this part of the sub- 
ject. Every person knows, that war between nations has often arisen 
from the most trifling causes ; when thousands of human beings, alike 
ignorant and innocent of its origin, hired by its authors, armed with 
murderous weapons and incessantly exercised in the use of them, are 
marshaled into the presence of a similar host; when both being stimu- 
lated by inflaming addresses, and often excited by ardent spirits, destroy 
each other like infuriated tigers ! Then after one party is overcome, the 
other glorying in the slaughter, hail their leader a hero, and not infre- 
quently do that, which fiends would shudder to think of — viz. return 
thanks to the benign Savior of men, for having enabled them thus to de- 



Chap. 9.] Buckets. 67 

stroy their species; and to produce an amount of misery, as evinced in the 
shrieks of the wounded — the agonies of the dying — the unutterable 
pangs of widows, and the untold sufferings of orphans — that would suffice 
to draw tears from demons ! And all this for what % Why, at one time, accord- 
mo - to Tasso, and it is degrading to our nature to repeat it, because some 
thieves of Modena stole a bucket belonging to a public well of Bologna ! This 
fatal bucket is still preserved in the cathedral of Modena — a memorial 
of a sanguinary war, and of the evils attending the most horrible of all 
human delusions, military glory. 

"In the year 1005, some soldiers of the commonwealth of Modena ran 
away with a bucket from a public well, belonging to the State of Bologna. 
This implement might be worth a shilling; but it produced a bloody 
quarrel which was worked up into a bloody war. Henry, the king of 
Sardinia, for the Emperor Henry the second, assisted the Modenese to 
keep possession of the bucket ; and in one of the battles he was made 
prisoner. His father, the Emperor, offered a chain of gold that would 
encircle Bologna, which is seven miles in compass, for his son's ransom, 
but in vain. After twenty-two years imprisonment, and his father being 
dead, he pined away and died. His monument is still extant in the 
church of the Dominicans. This fatal bucket is still exhibited in the 
tower of the cathedral of Modena, enclosed in an iron cage." 

Materials of Buckets. — Neptune and Andromache watered horses 
with metallic ones. Both Greeks and Romans had them of wood, metal 
and leather. Sometimes wooden ones were hooped with brass. One of 
these was found in a Roman barrow in England. The ancient British 
had them without hoops and cut out of solid timber. The Anglo Saxons 
made them of staves as at present. Those of the old Egyptians were 
of metal, wood, skins or leather, and probably of earthenware. See 
figures in 11th and 13th chapters. We have given figures of some metallic 
ones discovered in Pompeii, in Book II. The bucket of Bologna is 
formed of staves and bound with iron hoops. 3 

The old error that 'water has no weight in water,' arose from not per- 
ceiving the weight of a bucket, until it was raised out of the liquid in 
which it was plunged. 

Although poetry is foreign to the design of this work, and cold water 
is not remarkably inspiring, nor a bucket a very poetical object, yet the 
following beautiful lines of S. Woodworth, on c The Bucket,' are as re- 
freshing in the midst of a dry discussion, as a draught of the sparkling li- 
quid to a weary traveller of the desert. b 

That moss-covered vessel I bail as a treasure ; 

For often at noon, when returned from the field, 
I found it the source of an exquisite pleasure, 

The purest and sweetest that nature can yield. 

How ardent I seized it, with hands that were glowing, 
And quick to the white-pebbled bottom it fell : 

Then soon, with the emblem of truth overflowing, 
And dripping with coolness, it rose from the well. 

How sweet from the green mossy brim-to receive it, 
As poised on the curb it inclined to my lips ! 

Not a full blushing goblet could tempt me to leave it, 
Though filled with the nectar that Jupiter sips. 



• Misson's Travels, iii, 327, and Keysler's Travels, iii, 138. 

b They have been erroneously attributed to the British Poet Wordsworth. 



68 



The Windlass. 



[Book C 



C HAP TE R X. 

The Windlass: Its origin unknown— Employed in raising water from wells, and ore from mines— • 
Chinese windlass— Other inventions of that people, as table forks, winnowing machines, &c. &c. Fu- 
see: Its application to raise water from wells-Its inventor not known. Wheel and pinion— Anglo- 
Saxon crane— Drum attached to the windlass roller, and turned by a rope: Used in Birmah, England, 
&c. Tread wheels : Used by the Ancients— Moved by men and various animals— Jacks— Horizontal 
tread wheels— Common wheel or capstan. Observations on the introduction of table forks into Europe. 

THE WINDLASS. 

Although it may never be known to whom the world is indebted for 
the windlass, there are circumstances which point to the construction of 
wells and raising of water from them, as among the first uses to which it, 
as well as the pulley, was applied. The windlass possesses an important 
advantage over the single pulley in lifting weights, or overcoming any 
resistance; since the intensity of the force transmitted through it, can 
be modified, either by varying the length of the crank, or the circum- 
ference of the roller on which the rope is coiled. Sometimes a single 
vessel and rope, but more frequently two, are employed, as in the figure, 
No. 18. 




No. 18. Windlass. From Kircher's Mundus Subterraneus. 

The buckets are suspended from opposite sides of the roller, the rope 
winding round it in different directions, so that, as one ascends, the other 
descends. Pliny, in his Natural History, xix, 4, mentions this machine as 
used by the Romans for raising water ; and in the 36th book, cap. xv, 
when speaking of a canal for draining the marsh Fucinus, part of which 
passed through a mountain, he says the water which flowed in upon the 
workmen was raised up " with device of engines and windiest As there 
was not any apparatus attached to the public wells in Greek and Roman 
cities, or if so, to a very limited extent, it is probable the windlass was 
chiefly used in the country, where its application to deep wells was per- 
haps as common as it is in other parts of the world at the present time. 

It has always been used in raising ore and water from mines. Agricola 
has given several figures of it as employed in those of Hungary, where 



Chap. 10.] 



Chinese Windlass. 



G4 



it has probably been in uninterrupted use since the Roman era. a Some - 
times it was placed on one side of the well, and at a short distance from 
it, the ropes passing through pulleys that were suspended over its mouth. 
By this arrangement water may be raised to any required height above 
the windlass ; an advantage in some cases very desirable. Belidor has 
given a similar figure, and observes that such machines were extensively 
used in the Low Countries. 5 Sometimes a series of pulleys were com- 
bined with it. In an old work, we have seen the windlass attached to a 
large tub in which water or coal was raised, so that one or more persons 
might ascend and descend, without the aid of others on the surface of the 
ground; the ropes being passed through a block above the mouth of the 
pit. c It is very probable that these applications of it were known to the 
Greeks and Romans. Switzer, in his 'Hydrostatics,' says, the ancients 
used the windlass for raising water, and that all their machines of a similar 
construction were classed under the general name of Budromia. 

There is a very peculiar and exceedingly ingenious modification of 
the windlass, which may here be noticed, and for which we are indebted 
to the Chinese. It furnishes the means of increasing mechanical energy 
to almost any extent, and as it is used by them to raise water from some 
of those prodigiously deep wells already noticed, (p. 30,) a figure of it, 
(No. 19.) is inserted. The roller consists of two parts of unequal di- 
ameters, to the extremities of which, the ends of the rope are fastened on 
opposite sides, so as to wind round both parts in different directions. As 
the load to be raised is suspended to a pulley, (See fig.) every turn of the 
roller raises a portion of the rope equal to the circumference of the thicker 
part, but at the same time lets down a portion equal to that of the smaller; 
consequently the weight is raised at each turn, through a space equal only 
to half the difference between the circumferences of the two parts of the 
roller. The action of this machine is therefore slow, but the mechanical 
advantages are proportionably great. d 




No. 19. Chinese Windlass. 



No. 20. Fusee Windlass. 



This is the neatest and most simple modification of the wheel and axle, 
that human ingenuity has devised, and is a proof that the principles of 
mechanical science were well understood in remote ages ; for every me- 



a De Re Metallica, Basil. 1657. p. 118, 119, 160. 

b Architecture Hydraulique, torn. 2, p. 333. 

c Besson's Theatre des Instrvrnens Mathematiques et Mechaniques. 

«'The Chinese,' by J. F- Davis, vol. ii, 286. 



A Lyon, 1579. 



70 The Fusee. [Book 1. 

chanician, we think will admit, that mechanical tact and ingenuity, unaided 
by scientific knowledge, could never have devised it. It exhibits a species 
of originality so unique, so simple and efficient, that evidently shows it to 
have been the conception of no common mind. At what time it was first 
taken to Europe, we have not the means of ascertaining. It has but re- 
cently, i. e. comparatively so, been described in books. We are not 
aware of its having been noticed in any, previous to the last half century. 
It appears to have been introduced like several other standard machines 
from the same source, so gradually, that the precise period of its first ar- 
rival cannot easily be determined. Considering the long period, during 
which European nations have maintained an intercourse with the Chinese, 
the recent introduction of this machine may appear singular ; but very 
little is yet known of that people, although an intimate acquaintance with 
their arts, would probably enrich us with treasures, more valuable than 
their teas and their porcelain. 

There is a large debt of gratitude due to the Chinese, which has never 
been sufficiently acknowledged. It is to them, we are indebted for some 
of the most important discoveries connected with the present state of the 
arts and sciences. From them was derived the chief of all arts, printing, 
and even movable types, and that invaluable acquisition, the mariner's 
compass; peculiar stoves,* chain-bridges, spectacles, silver forks, b India 
ink, c chain-pump, winnowing machine, d besides many others; and to cor- 
rect a popular error, which attributes to our fellow citizens of Connec 
ticut, the invention of ' wooden hams,' it may as well be remarked, that 
these are also of Chinese origin. Le Comte, says they are so adroitly 
constructed, that numerous buyers are constantly deceived; and fre- 
quently it is not till one is boiled and ready to be eaten, that it is dicovered 
to be " nothing but a large piece of wood under a hog's skin." But if 
China has produced specimens of dishonest ingenuity, she has, in the 
tread-mill, furnished one of the greatest terrors to evil doers. 

A large Fusee is sometimes used in place of the cylindrical roller of a 
windlass, especially in wells of great depth. When a bucket is at the bot- 
tom, and the weight of a long rope or chain has to be overcome in ad- 
dition to that of the water, it is accomplished more easily by winding up 

a "These stoves are extremely convenient, and deserve to be made known universally 
in our country. Some of our company took such stoves with them to Gottenburgh, as 
models for those who might want to know their construction." Osbeck's Voyage to 
China, vol. i, 322. 

b "The use of silver forks with us, by some of our spruce gallants taken up of late, 
came from China to Italy, and from thence to England." Heylin's Cosmography, Lon. 
1670. p. 865. 

c The secret of making it, was brought by a Dutch supercargo to Gottingen in 1756, 
and there divulged. Lon. Mag. for 1756. p. 403. 

d This was also brought first to Holland in the beginning of the 18th century, whence 
it soon spread over Europe. It was carried to Scotland in 1710. Walter Scott, has 
incorporated in one of his novels, an historical fact relating to the superstition of his 
countrymen respecting it. When first introduced, the religious feelings of some were 
greatly shocked at an invention, by which artificial whirlwinds were produced in calm 
weather, when, as they supposed, it was the will of God for the air to remain still. As 
they considered it a moral duty to wait patiently for a natural wind, to separate the 
chaff from their wheat, they looked upon the use of this machine, as rebellion against 
heaven, and an attempt to take the government of the world out of the Creator's 
hands! Constant readers of the Bible, the more superstitious of the Covenanters ima- 
gined it was a cunning device of the Wicked One, the ' Prince of the power of the 
Air,' and therefore one of those works, which Christians are called to guard against and 
renounce ! It was introduced into America in 1761, as a "Dutch machine for winnow- 
ing grain." The first one, was made in Massachusetts, "by the directions of a gentle- 
man in the Jersies," during the same year. Lon. Mag. for 1761. p. 273. Davis' Chi- 
nese, vol. ii, 361. 



Chap. 10. 



Wheel and Pinion. 



71 



the rope on the small end of the fusee ; and as the length diminishes, it 
coils round the larger part. (See No. 20, which is however inaccurately 
drawn — as the bucket is at the top of the well, it should have been repre- 
sented as suspended from the large end of the fusee.) The value of a de- 
vice like this, will be appreciated when the great depth of some wells 
is considered, and the consequent additional weight of the chains. In 
the fortress of Dresden is a well, eighteen hundred feet deep ; at Span- 
genburgh one of sixty toises ; at Homberg, one of eighty : at August- 
burgh, is a well at which half an hour is required to raise the bucket ; 
and at Nuremburgh another, sixteen hundred feet deep. In all these, the 
water is raised by chains, and the weight of the last one is stated to be 
upwards of a ton: Misson, (vol. i, 116,) says three thousand pounds. 

It is to be regretted that the name of the inventor of the fusee, and the 
date of its origin, are alike unknown. It forms an essential part in the me- 
chanism of ordinary watches ; for without it they would not be correct 
measurers of time. Every person knows that the moving power in a 
clock is a weight, and that the various movements are regulated by a 
pendulum ; but neither weights nor pendulums are suited to portable 
clocks, or watches ; hence a spiral spring is adopted as the first mover in 
the latter, and when coiled up, as it is by the act of ' winding up' a watch, 
the force which it exerts, imparts motion to the train of wheels ; but as 
this force gradually diminishes as the spring unwinds, the velocity of the 
train would diminish also, if some mode of equalizing the effect of this 
varying force was not adopted : It is the fusee which does this, by 
receiving the energy of the spring when at its maximum, on its smaller 
end ; and as this energy diminishes, it acts on the larger parts, as on the 
ends of levers, which lengthen in the same ratio as the force that moves 
them is diminished. 




No. 21. Windlass with 



"heel 



In another modification of the windlass, a cog-wheel is fixed to one end 
of the roller, and moved by a pinion that is secured on a separate shaft, and 
turned by a crank, as in the figure. By proportioning the diameter of the 
wheel and that of the pinion, (or the number of teeth on each) according 
to the power employed ; a bucket and its contents may be raised from 






72 



Anglo Saxon Crane. 



[Book I. 



any depth, since a diminution in the velocity of the wheel from a smaller 
pinion, is accompanied with an increase of the energy transmitted to the 
roller and vice versa. 

The Greeks and Romans employed the wheel and pinion in several of 
their war engines, and in various other machinery. Part of a cog-wheel 
was discovered in Pompeii. They probably were also employed, as in 
No. 21, to raise water from deep wells, a purpose for which they have 
been long used in Europe. See Belidor, torn, ii, liv. 4. From some ex 
periments made by Mr. Robertson Buchanan, it was ascertained that the 
labor of a man in working a pump, turning a winch, ringing a bell, and 
rowing a boat, might be represented respectively by the numbers, 100, 
167, 227, and 248 ; hence it appears that the effect of a man's labor in 
turning a windlass, is fifty per cent, more than in working a pump in the 
ordinary way by a lever. 

As a man cannot, with effect, apply his 
strength conveniently to a crank that de- 
scribes a circle exceeding three or four feet 
in diameter, another ancient contrivance 
enabled him to transmit it through a series of 
revolving levers, inserted into one or both 
ends of the roller; and which extended to a 
greater distance from the centre than the 
crank, as in the copper-plate printing press, 
the steering wheel of ships and steam ves- 
sels, and numerous other apparatus employed 
in the arts. It was formerly used to raise 
'water in buckets from mines and wells, 
and even to work pumps : (cams being se- 
cured to the roller, raised the piston rods in a 
manner similar to the common stamping mills.) Agricola has figured it 
as applied to both purposes. De Re Metallica, 118, 129, 141. No. 22, 
is an example of its application by the Anglo Saxons, from Strutt's An- 
tiquities 




No. 22. Anglo Saxon Crane. 




No. 23. Drum attached to a Windlass. 



" There cannot be a more expeditious way to raise water from a deep 
well, than to make a large wheel, [drum] at the end of the wi?dace, 
that may be two or three times the diameter of the winlace, on 
which a smaller and longer rope may be wound, than that which raises 



Chap. 10.J Tread Wheel. 73 

the bucket, so that when the bucket is in the well, the same rope is all 
wpund on the greater wheel, [drum] the end whereof may be taken on 
the shoulder, and the man may walk or run forwards, till the bucket be 
drawn up. The bucket may have a round hole in the midst of the bot- 
tom with a cover fitted to it, like the sucker of a pump, that when the 
bucket rests on the water, the hole may open and the bucket fill." Dic- 
tionarium Rusticum, Lon. 1704. See No. 23. 

This is one of the modes of raising heavy weights, described by Vitru- 
vius, in Book X of his Architecture, and is so figured in some of the old 
editions, that of Barbaro for example. Venice 1567. It appears to have been 
adopted to raise water from the deep wells of Asia in ancient times, and 
is still continued in use there. In Sym's Embassy to Ava, there is a notice 
of the Petroleum Wells, the oil from which is universally employed 
throughout the Birman empire. One which he examined was four feet 
square, and thirty-seven fathoms, [222 feet] deep. The water and oil 
" were drawn up in an iron pot, fastened to a rope passed over a wooden 
cylinder, which revolves on an axis supported by two upright posts. 
When the pot is filled, two men take the rope by the end, and run down 
a declivity, which is cut in the ground to a distance equivalent to the depth 
of the well ; thus when they reach the end of their track, the pot is 
raised to its proper elevation." 3 The contents, water and oil, are then dis- 
charged into a cistern, and the water is afterwards drawn off through a 
hole in the bottom. A ratchet wheel and click to detain the bucket when 
elevated, would enable a single person to work this machine, or the 
bucket might be suspended to its bail by swivels, and overturned at the 
top by a catch, as in No. 16. 




No. 24. Tread Wheel. 

Another mode of communicating motion to the roller, is by means of a 
tread wheel, attached like the drum in figure 23, to one end of it. In 
this, a man or an animal walks or rather climbs up one side, somewhat 
like a squirrel in its cage, and by his weight turns the wheel, and raises 
the water, as represented in No. 24. 

This appears to have been a common mode of applying human effort 
among the ancients. Some of their cranes for raising columns and other 



a Embassy to Ava, Lon. 1800,. vol. iii, 236. See also an account of these wells, and 
modes of raising their contents, in vol. ix, of Tilloch's Phil. Mag. p. 228 

10 



74 Tread WJieels Propelled by Animals [Book I. 

heavy weights, were moved by tread, wheels, (Vitruvius, x, 4.) A figure 
of one is preserved in a bas-relief, in the wall of the market place at Ca- 
pua. 11 Like other ancient devices for raising water it has been continued 
in use in Europe since Roman times, and is described by most of the old 
writers on Hydraulics. Agricola figures it as used in the mines of Ger- 
many. " To raise water from a deepe well," says an old English writer, 
"some use a large wheele for man or beast to walk in." At Nice, two 
men raise the water from a deep well, by walking in one of these wheels. 
It is the ' Kentish fashion' according to Fosbroke, the wheels being pro- 
pelled both by men and asses. The Anglo Saxons and Normans also used 
them for drawing water. 

Whether the Greeks and Romans employed animals in tread wheels, 
we know not, but the practice is very old, and from the obvious advan- 
tage of quadrupeds over biped man in climbing ascents, it is probable 
that they were so employed by the ancients. Oxen, horses, mules, asses, 
dogs, goats and bears, have all been used to propel these wheels, and to 
raise water by them. At Spangenburgh, water was raised from the 
well mentioned in a previous chapter, by an ass. In the Isle of Wight, 
Eng. one was thus engaged for the extraordinary period of forty years, 
in raising water from a well two hundred feet deep, which was supposed 
to have been dug by the Romans. Long practice had taught the animal 
to know exactly how many revolutions were required to raise the 
bucket; when by a backward movement he would instantly stop the 
wheel. Goats are remarkable for scaling precipices, and therefore seem 
well adapted for this kind of labor. In Europe, they are employed to 
raise both water and ore from mines, by tread wheels. In the Chapter 
on the Chain-Pump, we have inserted a cut from Agricola, representing 
them thus engaged, But of the larger animals, if there is one better 
adapted than another, from its conformation and habits, it is the Bear ; and 
it is not a little singular, that the Goths actually employed that animal in 
such wheels to raise water. b 

It is probable that the Chinese have from remote times employed va- 
rious animals in them ; this we infer from a remark of one of their wri- 
ters, quoted by Dr. Milne. In exhorting husbands to instruct their 
wives, he encourages them in the arduous task by reminding them, that 
"even monkeys may be taught to play antics — dogs may be taught to tread 
in a mill — cats may be taught to run round a cylinder, and parrots may 
be taught to recite verses;" and hence he concludes it possible to teach 
women something! Many ancient customs relating to the taming and 
using of animals are still practised in China. The old Egyptians, had ba- 
boons and monkeys trained to gather fruit from trees and precipices inac- 
cessible to men. d The Chinese employ them for the same purposed 
Mark Antony, Nero, and others, in imitation of more ancient warriors, 
were sometimes drawn in chariots by lions — Chinese charlatans, both ride 
on, and are drawn by them, and by tigers also. (NieuhofF's Embassy.) 



Before smohe jacks were invented, joints of meat while roasting, were 
often turned by dogs running in tread-wheels. They were of a pecu- 
liar breed, (now nearly extinct) long backed, having short legs, and from 



*Fosbroke Antiq. 257, and Winkleman's Arts of the Ancients. Paris, Ed. torn, ii, 
planche 13. 

b Olaus Magnus, quoted by Fosbroke. Encyc. Antiq. 71. c Downing's Stranger in 
China, vol. ii, 172. d Wilkinson, vol. ii, 150. e Breton's China. 



onap. 10.J Tread Wheels. lb 

their occupation, were named turnspits. The mode of teaching them, 
'was more summary than humane. The animal was put into a wheel, the 
sides of which were closed, and a burning coal thrown in behind him ; 
hence he could not stop climbing without having his legs burned. As 
might be supposed, they were by no means attached to their profession ; 
of which the following incident has been adduced as a proof: In a cer- 
tain city, having agreeably to custom, attended their owners to church, 
the lesson for the day, happened to be that chapter of Ezekiel wherein 
the self-moving chariots are described. When the minister first pro- 
nounced the word 'wheel,' they all pricked up their ears in alarm — at the 
second mention of it, they set up a doleful howl; and when the awful 
word was uttered a third time, every one it is said, made the best of his 
way out of the church. 

But the most singular animal formerly used in thus turning the spit, 
was a bird, and of a species too which furnished more victims for the 
roast than any other, viz. the goose/ Moxon, observes that although dogs 
were commonly used, "geese are better, for they will bear their labor 
longer, so that if there be need, they will continue their labor twelve 
hours." a A singular illustration of man's power over the lower animals, 
in thus compelling one to cook another of its own species for his use. 

The old jack, consisting of three toothed wheels and a weight, was 
used as early as 1444. The smoke jack was known in the following cen- 
tury, if not before, for it was described by Cardan, and afterwards (in 
1571) by Bartolomeo Scappi, cook to Pope Pius V. in a book on culinary 
operations. In 1601, a 'jack maker' was a regular trade in Europe, and 
the ingenuity of the manufacturers was then often displayed in decorating 
them with moving puppets, as in some ancient clocks, and in the organs, 
&c. of street musicians. Bishop Wilkins, (Mathematical Magic, B. ii, 
cap. 3) speaks of "jacks no bigger than a walnut to turn any joint of meat." 

The name of these machines, and a certain vulgar phrase, not yet 
quite obsolete, are all that is left to recal to mind, a class of domestics, 
whose occupation, like Othello's, is gone. These were men whose duty 
it was to turn the spit, and who answered to the familiar cognomen of 
'Jack,' formerly a common name for a man-servant, and now applied to 
designate numerous instruments that supply his place. Seated at one 
side of a huge fire, his duty was to turn the roast by a crank attached to 
one end of the spit. See a figure of a French tourne-broche in the exer- 
cise of his vocation, in 'Hone's Every Day Book.' vol. ii, 1057. The office 
was far from being a sinecure, since no slight labor was required to move 
the large joints of olden times, the whole of a sheep or an ox being fre- 
quently roasted at once; hence in some kitchens built in the 13th century, 
it was particularly directed, that each should be provided with furnaces 
sufficiently large to roast two or even three oxen. It was from the cus- 
tom of these artists, of surreptitiously helping themselves to small pieces 
of the roast, while in the performance of their duty, the unclassical ex- 
pression 'licking the fingers,' came, and verifying a Turkish proverb, 'he 
that watches the kettle, is sure to have some of the soup.' The phrase 
however, was not then so obnoxious to good taste, nor the act to good 
manners, as now; for table-forks were generally unknown, and moderate 
sized joints were handed round on the spit, so that every one at table, 
separated by a knife a slice to his taste, and conveyed it by his fingers 



a Mechanick Powers, Lon. 1696. p. 72. 



76 



Horizontal Tread Wheel. 



[Book 1. 



to his plate, and thence to his mouth. Hence the advice of Ovid, for 
neither Greeks nor Romans used table-forks : 

" Your meat genteelly with your fingers raise ; 

And — as in eating there's a certain grace, 

Beware, with greasy hands, lest you besmear your face. 

A German writer in the middle of the 16th century, in suggesting the 
whirling Eolipile as a turnspit, remarks, "it eats nothing, and gives withal 
an assurance to those partaking of the feast, whose suspicious natures 
nurse queasy appetites, that the haunch has not been pawed by the turn- 
spit, in the absence of the housewife's eyes, for the pleasure of licking 
his unclean fingers." This evil propensity of human turnspits, however, 
eventually led to their dismissal, and to the employment of another spe- 
cies, which, if not better disposed to resist the same temptations, had 
less opportunities afforded of falling into them. These were the canine 
laborers already noticed. 




No. 25. Horizontal Tread-Wheel, from Agricola. 

Horizontal tread-wheels for raising water are described by Agricola, 
from whose work, De Re Metallica, we have copied the figure. Two 
men on opposite sides of a horizontal bar, against which they lean, 
push with their feet the bars of the wheel on which they tread, behind 
them. Similar wheels, inclined to the horizon were also used. For an 
other kind of tread- wheel, see chapters 14, and 17. On the Noria and 
Chain-pump. 

In all the preceding machines the roller is used in a horizontal position; 
but at some unknown period of past ages, another modification was de- 
vised, one, by which the power could be applied at any distance from 
the centre. Instead of placing the roller as before, over the well's mouth, 
it was removed a short distance from it, and secured in a vertical position, 
by which it was converted into the wheel or capstan. One or more hori- 
zontal bars were attached to it, of a length adapted to the power em- 
ployed, whether of men or animals ; and an alternating rotary movement 
imparted to it, as in the common wheel or capstan, represented in the next 
figure, No. 26. It appears from Belidor, (Torn, ii, 333) that machines of this 
kind, and worked by men were common in Europe previous to, and at the 



Chap. 10.] Common Wheel. 77 

time he wrote. Sometimes the shaft was placed in the edge of the well, 
so that the person that moved it walked round the latter, and thus occu- 
pied less space. 




No. 26. Common Wheel or Capstan. 



Circumstances, highly illustrative of European manners during the 
early part of the 17th and preceding centuries, are associated with the in- 
troduction of table-forks. They were partially known in Italy in the 11th 
century, for in a letter of Peter Damiani, who died in 1073, mention is 
made of a lady from Constantinople, who was married to the Doge of 
Venice, and who among other strange customs, required rain-water to 
wash herself, and was so fastidious respecting her food, as to use a fork, 
and a golden one too, to take her meat, which was previously cut into 
small pieces by her servant. Lon. Quart. Review, vol. 58. (April, 1837.) 
They are mentioned, (probably as curiosities) in a charter of Ferdinand 
I. of Spain, 1101, and in the wardrobe accounts of Edward I. of England, 
' a pair of knives with sheathes of silver enameled, and a forke of chrystal,' 
are specified. Fosbroke, Ency. Ant. Forks were common in Italy in 
the 15th century, although nearly unknown in France and England in the 
following one. At the close of the 16th, they are noticed as a luxury in 
France, and lately introduced. Henry the Fourth's fork is still preserved 
— it has two prongs, and is of steel. So late as 1641, they were not uni- 
versal in Paris. In a representation of a great feast held by the cobblers 
in that year, and attended by musicians, &c. — no forks are on the 
table — the carver holds what appears to be a leg of mutton with one hand, 
while with the other he cuts a slice off, for a lady seated next to him. 
Hone's Every Day Book, vol. ii, 1055. 

They were not used in England till about the same time, a period much 
later than might have been supposed. In 1611, an Englishman was ridi- 
culed for using one. This was Coryatt the eccentric traveler. " I ob- 
served," he says, " a custom in all those Italian cities and townes through 
the which I passed, that is not used in any other country that I saw in my 
travels; neither do I think that any other nation of Christendome doth use 
it, but only Italy. The Italian and most strangers that are commorant, 
[dwelling] in Italy do alwaies at their meaies use a little forke, when they 
cut their meate. For while with their knife, which they hold in one 
hand, they cut the meate out of the dish, they fasten their forke which 



78 Table-Forks. [Book I. 

they hold in the other hand, upon the same dish. So that whatsoever he 
be, that sitting in the company of any others at meale, should unadvisedly 
touch the dish of meate with his fingers, from which all at the table doe 
cut, he will give occasion of offense unto the company, as having trans- 
gressed the Jawes of good manners ; insomuch that for his error, he shall 
be at least brow-beaten, if not reprehended in words. This forme of 
feeding, I understand, is generally used in all places in Italy, their forkes 
being for the most part made of yron or Steele, and some of silver ; but 
these are used only by gentlemen. The reason of this their curiosity is, 
because the Italian cannot by any means have his dish touched with fin- 
gers, seeing all men's fingers are not alike cleane — hereupon I myself 
thought good to imitate the Italian fashion, by tii\s forked cutting of meate, 
not only while I was in Italy, but also in Germany, and oftentimes in Eng- 
land since I came home : being once quipped for that frequent using of 
my forke, by a certain learned gentleman, a familiar friend of mine, one 
Master Laurence Whitaker, who in his merry humour doubted not to 
call me Furcifer, only for using a forke at feeding." 

In this extract, we have a view of Italian gentlemen ' feeding' in the 
beginning of the 17th century, and in the following one, we obtain an in- 
sight into British manners during the middle of it. Forty years after the 
publication of Coryatt's Travels, a Manual of Cookery appeared, con- 
taining the following instructions to British ladies, when at table. " A 
gentlewoman being at table, abroad or at home, must observe to keep her 
body straighte, and lean not by any means upon her elbowes — nor by ra- 
venous gesture discover a voracious appetite. Talke not when you have 
meate in your mouthe ; and do not smacke like a pig — nor eat spoone- 
meat so hot that the tears stand in your eyes. It is very uncourtly 
to drinke so large a draught that your breath is almost gone, and you are 
forced to blow strongly to recover yourselfe. Throwing down your li- 
quor as into a funnel, is an action fitter for a juggler than a gentlewoman. 
In carving at your own table, distribute the best pieces first, and it will 
appeare very decent and comely to use a forke ; so touch no piece of meat 
without it." This elegant extract is from ' The Accomplished Lady's Rich 
Closet of Rarities' London, 1653. Neither knives nor forks were used at 
the tables of the Egyptians. A representation of a feasting party is sculp- 
tured on a tomb near the pyramids, a copy of which is inserted in Vol. II, 
of Wilkinson's interesting work. One gentleman holds a small joint of 
meat in his hand, two are eating fish which they retain in their fingers, 
while another is separating the wing of a goose with the same implements 



Chap. 11.] Machines for the Irrigation of Land. 79 



CHAP TER XI 

Agriculture gave rise to numerous devices for raising water — Curious definition of Egyptian bus 
bandry — Irrigation always practised in the east — Great fertility of watered land — The construction of 
the lakes and canals of Egypt and China, subsequent to the use of hydraulic machines— Phenomenon 
in ancient Thebes — Similarity of the early histories of the Egyptians and Chinese — Mythology based 
on agriculture and irrigation : Both inculcated as a part of religion — Asiatic tanks — Watering land with 
the yoke and pots — An employment of the Israelites in Egypt — Hindoo Water Bearer — Curious shaped 
vessels — Aquarius, ' the Water Pourer,' an emblem of irrigation — Connection of astronomy with agri- 
culture — Swinging baskets of Egypt, China and Hindostan. Arts and customs of the ancient Egyptians, 

The last three chapters include most of the methods adopted by the an- 
cients to raise water for domestic purposes. There is, however, another 
class of machines of equal merit and importance, which probably had 
their origin in agriculture, i. e. in the irrigation of land. Persons who 
live in temperate climates, where water generally abounds, can scarcely 
realize the importance of artificial irrigation, to the people of Asia and 
other parts of the earth. It was this, which chiefly contributed to sup- 
port those swarms of human beings, who anciently dwelt on the plains of 
the Euphrates, the Ganges, the Nile, and other large rivers. In Egypt 
alone, the existence of millions of our species has in all times depended 
wholly upon it, and hence the antiquity of machines to raise water among 
that people. The definition of oriental agriculture is all but incompre- 
hensible to an uninformed American or European — it is said to consist 
chiefly, "in having suitable machines for raising water," a definition suffi- 
ciently descriptive of the profession of our firemen, but few people would 
ever suppose it explanatory of that of a farmer. It is however literally 
true. Irrigation is everything — the whole system of husbandry is inclu- 
ded in it; and no greater proof of its value need be given, than the fact 
of machines employed to raise water for that purpose in Egypt, being 
taxed. 

The agricultural pursuits of man, must at a very early period have con- 
vinced him of the value of water in increasing the fruitfulness of the soil : 
he could not but observe the fertilizing effects of rain, and the rich vege- 
tation consequent on the periodical inundations of rivers; nor on the other 
hand, could he possibly have remained ignorant of the sterility conse- 
quent on long continued droughts : hence nature taught man the art of ir- 
rigating land, and confirmed him in the practice of it, by the benefits it 
invariably produced. In some countries the soil was thus rendered so 
exceedingly fruitful as to exceed credibility. Herodotus, when speak- 
ing of Babylonia, which was chiefly watered by artificial irrigation, (for 
the Assyrians he observes, 'had but little rain,') says, it was the most 
fruitful of all the countries he had visited. Corn, he said never produced 
less than two hundred-fold, and sometimes three hundred ; and after re- 
citing some other examples, he remarks, that those persons who had 
not seen the country, would deem his account of it a violation of proba- 
bility — in other words, a traveler's tale. Clio, 193. Five hundred years 
afterwards, the elder Pliny speaking of the same country, observes, 
"there is not a territory in all the east comparable to it in fertility;" 
while in another part of his work, he refers to the cause of its fruitful- 
ness — he says, the principal care required, was, "to keep the ground well 
watered." Nat. Hist, vi, 26, and xviii, 17. 



80 Hydraulic Works of [Book I. 

Mr. St. John, mentions a species of Indian corn growing in the fields 
of Egypt, prodigiously prolific. On one ear, three thousand grains were 
reckoned ! and a lady, who frequently made the experiment in the The- 
baid, constantly found between eighteen hundred and two thousand. 
Egypt and Mahommed Ali, vol. i, 143. Another proof of the value of 
irrigation is given by Herodotus. When speaking of that part of Egypt 
near Memphis, he observes, that the people enjoyed the fruits of the earth 
with the smallest labor. " They have no occasion for the process nor the 
instruments of agriculture, usual and necessary in other countries." This 
remark of the historian, has been ridiculed by some authors ; but its truth 
has been verified by recent travelers.* 

The advantages of artificial irrigation have not only been known from 
the earliest ages, but some of the most stupendous works which the intel- 
lect of man ever called into existence, were designed for that purpose : 
works so ancient as to perplex our chronologists, and so vast as to incline 
some historians to class them among natural formations. Ancient writers 
unite in asserting that Lake Mceris was ' the work of men's hands/ and 
constructed by a king of that name ; its prodigious extent, however, has 
led some modern authors to question its alleged origin, although artificial 
works still extant, equal it in the amount of labor required ; as the Wall 
of China, the Pyramids, and other works of ancient Egypt. Sir William 
Chambers, when comparing the works of the remote ancients with those 
of Greece, observes that the city of Babylon would have covered all 
Attica ; that a greater number of men were employed in building it, than 
there were inhabitants of Greece ; that more materials were consumed in 
a single Egyptian Pyramid, than in all the public structures of Athens ; 
and that Lake Mareotis could have deluged the Peloponnesus, and ruined 
all Greece. But incredible as the accounts of Lakes Mceris and Mareotis 
may appear, these works did not surpass, if they equaled, another example 
of Egyptian engineering, which had previously been executed. This was 
the removal of the Nile itself! In the reign of Menes, (the first, or one 
of the first sovereigns) it swept along the Libyan chain of mountains, that 
is, on one side of the valley that constitutes Egypt ; and in order to render 
it equally beneficial to both sides, a new channel was formed through the 
centre of the valley, into which it was directed : an undertaking which 
indicates a high degree of scientific knowledge at that early period. 

Before the lakes and canals of Egypt or China could have been under- 
taken, the inhabitants must have been long under a regular government, 
and one which could command the resources of a settled people, and of a 
people too, who from experience could appreciate the value of such works 
for the purpose of irrigation, as well as the inefficiency of previous devices 
for the same object ; that is, of machines for raising the water : for if it 
be supposed the construction of canals to convey, of reservoirs to contain, 
and of locks and sluices to distribute water, preceded the use of machines 
for raising it — it would be admitting that men in ignorant times had the 
ability to conceive, and the skill to execute the most extensive and perfect 
works that civil engineering ever produced — to have formed lakes like 
oceans, and conveyed rivers through deserts, ere they well knew how to 
raise water in a bucket, or transmit it through a pipe or a gutter. The 
fact is, ages must necessarily have elapsed before such works could have 
been dreamt of, and more before they could have been accomplished. 
Individuals would naturally have recourse to rivers in their immediate 
vicinity, from which (the Nile for example) they must long have toiled in 



«St. John, vol. i, 181. Lindsay, Let. 5. 



Chap. 11.] Ancient Egypt. 81 

raising water, before they would ever think of procuring it from other 
parts of the same stream, at distances varying from ten to a hundred miles, 
or' consent to labor for its conveyance over such extensive spaces. 

How extremely ancient, then, must hydraulic machinery be in Egypt, 
when such works as we have named, were executed in times that trans- 
pired long before the commencement of history — times that have been 
considered as extending back to the infancy of the world ! But if, as is 
generally supposed, civilization and the arts descended the Nile, then 
machines for raising water must have been employed on the upper borders 
of that river before Lower Egypt was peopled at all. In Nubia and 
Abyssinia they have at all times been indispensable, in consequence of the 
elevation of the banks and the absence of rain ; while in Middle and 
Lower Egypt, during the intervals of the annual overflow, they were also 
the only resource ; and at no time even there, could those grounds which 
lay beyond the reach, or above the. inundation, be irrigated without them. 
The surface of the river during 'low Nile' is, in parts of Nubia, 30 feet 
below the banks, in Middle Egypt 20 feet, and diminishes to the Delta. a 
In other countries, ram-water was (and still is) collected into reservoirs 
on the highest places, and distributed as required ; but nothing of this kind 
could ever have taken place in the land of the Pharaohs. We are informed 
the inhabitants of ancient Thebes were once thrown into great consterna- 
tion by a phenomenon which they looked upon as an omen of fearful 
import — it was simply a shower of rain ! This circumstance explains the 
opinion of the old Egyptians, in supposing the Greeks subject to famines, 
as their harvests depended on rain. Herod, ii, 13. 

A striking result derived from an examination of Egyptian history, 
observes Mr. Wilkinson, is the conviction, that the earliest times into which 
we are able to penetrate, civilized communities already existed, and society 
possessed all the features of later ages. The most remote period to which 
we can see, opens with a nation possessing all the arts of civilized life 
already matured. The pyramids of Memphis were erected within three 
hundred years of the Deluge ; and the Tombs of Beni-Hassan, hewn and 
painted with subjects describing the arts and manners of a refined people, 
about six hundred years after that event. From these paintings, &c. we 
learn that the manufacture of linen, of cabinet work, of glass, of elaborate 
works in gold and silver, bronze, &c. and numerous games, b &c. were 
then, as now, in vogue. The style of architecture was grand and chaste, 
for the fluted columns of Beni-Hassan " are of a character calling to mind 
the purity of the Doric." Indeed, modern science and the researches of 
travelers are daily adducing facts which set at defiance our ordinary chro- 
nological theories, but which appear to strengthen the opinion of those 
commentators of the scriptures, who consider the Deluge of Noah to have 
been, like that of Deucalion, local, not universal : a doctrine inconsistent 
with the postdiluvian origin of the mechanic arts generally, and of simple 
machines for raising water in particular. 

There is a striking resemblance between the early history of Egypt and 
that of China, with regard to the origin of, and esteem for agriculture, re- 
ligious ceremonies connected with it, artificial irrigation, modes of working 
the soil, and implements used. This art among both people was coeval 
with their existence as nations, and doubtless extends back, as ancient wri- 
ters assert, to periods anterior to Noah's flood. 6 Shinnung, the * divine 

a Wilk. An. Egypt, i, 9. 

b Lifting weights, wrestling, single stick, and bull-fights, games of ball, throwing knives 
odd and even, draughts, dice, and thimble-rig. are all represented on the monuments. 
c Le Comte's, China, 118, Lon. 1738. 

11 



82 Resemblance between the Chinese and Egyptians. [Book 1 

husbandman' resembled Osiris. He began to reign 2S32, B. C. or nearly 
five hundred years before the deluge ; and it is in imitation of this antedi- 
luvian monarch, that the emperors at the present day, plough a portion of 
land with their own hands, and sow different kinds of grain, once a year. 
Such it appears was also the practice of Egyptian monarchs, for emblema- 
tical representations of them breaking up the soil with a hoe, are found 
among the sculptures. Osiris instructed them in agriculture, and taught 
them the value and practice of irrigation. He confined the Nile within 
banks, and formed sluices to water the land. On ;hese accounts was he 
idolized after death, and worshipped as a god ; and the ox, which he taught 
them to employ in the cultivation of the soil, was selected to personate 
him. In accordance with this custom, the Israelites made and worshipped 
the calf (or ox) in the wilderness ; and Jereboam to gratify the ignorance 
or superstition of his countrymen, placed golden statues of them in Dan 
and Bethel ; or, perhaps from policy, introducing the. worship of Apis, as 
a compliment to Shishak, with whom he had found a refuge from the 
wrath of Solomon. Similar to the worship of Apis, is the great festival 
of the Chinese when the sun reaches the 15° of Aquarius, during which 
a figure of a cow is carried in the processions. The feast of Lanterns of 
this people, is also like that of lamps anciently held over all Egypt. Herod, 
li, 62. The celebrated Yu was, like some of his predecessors, raised to 
the throne of China, on account of his agricultural labors. We are in- 
formed that he drained a great portion of the land ; and that he wrote se- 
veral books on the cultivation of the soil, and on irrigation. He flourish- 
ed 2205, B. C. or about 140 years after the flood. Seventeen years after 
his death, it is admitted that husbandry became systematically organized, 
which necessarily included a settled plan of artificial irrigation. A writei 
in the Chinese Repository observes, " in these early ages, the fundamental 
maxims of the science of husbandry were established, which so far as we 
can learn, have been practised to the present day." Vol. iii, 121. Egypt- 
ian husbandry we are told consisted chiefly in having proper machines for 
raising water, and small canals judiciously disposed to distribute it over 
their fields. In both these respects it resembled that of China at the pre 
sent day ; a portable machine to raise water, being as necessary an imp]e- 
ment to a Chinese peasant as a spade is to one of ours. 

The mythology of the whole ancient world seems not only to have been 
intimately associated with agriculture, but appears to have been based up- 
on it. To the invention of the plough, and the irrigation of land, all the 
mysteries of Ceres may be referred. The great importance of agricul- 
ture in furnishing food to man, induced legislators at an early period to 
devise means to promote it. This they accomplished by connecting it 
with the worship of the gods ; and by classing the labors of husbandry 
among the most essential of religious duties. This system seems to have 
been universal. It was incorporated by the Roman lawgivers with the 
institutions of that people. Plutarch, in his life of Numa, expressly states 
that some of the laws were designed to recommend agriculture " as a part 
of religion." See also Fliny, xvii. 2. The sacred boohs of almost all the 
ancient nations placed irrigation, digging of tanks and wells, among those 
acts most acceptable to the gods ; and hence the Zendavesta of the Per- 
sians, and the Shaster of the Hindoos, distinctly inculcate the conveying 
of water to barren land, as one of the precepts of religion. 

As no country depended more upon agriculture for the physical and poli- 
tical existence of its inhabitants, than Egypt; so nowhere was religious ve- 
neration for it carried to a greater extent. We are informed their priests 
and statesmen used " all their influence in advancing the prosperity and 



Chap. 11.] 



Watering land with Pots. 



S3 



splendor of agriculture ;" and as Osiris made his own plough, both kings 
and priests wore sceptres of the form of that implement. So sensible 
were they of the blessings derived from agriculture, that they not only en- 
forced the worship of Osiris and Isis for its discovery and introduction, 
but caused even the animals (oxen) that assisted in the cultivation of 
their lands to be honored with religious rites. It cannot therefore be sup- 
posed, that a people, who thus consecrated almost every thing connec- 
ted with husbandry, should neglect that in which it chiefly consisted, viz : 
Irrigation ; for this was the real cause of the amazing fruitfulness of 
their soil, and of their individual and national prosperity. Thus Isis is 
often found represented with a bucket, as an emblem of irrigation, and of 
the fecundity of the Nile. a 

From the foregoing remarks the great antiquity of machines for raising 
water may be inferred ; for artificial irrigation certainly gave birth to the 
most valuable of our hydraulic engines, if it be not indeed the great pa- 
rent of them all. 

The ancient practice of constructing large tanks, to collect water for ir- 
rigation, is still followed in various parts of the east, and their dimensions 
render our reservoirs comparatively insignificant. In the Carnatic, some 
are eight miles in length, and three in breadth. In Bengal, they frequently 
cover a hundred acres, and are lined with stone. Knox, in his Historical 
Relation of Ceylon, (Lon. 1681,) says, the natives formed them of two 
and three fathoms deep, some of which were in length 'above a mile.' (p. 
9.) To these reservoirs, and the difficulty of making them sufficiently 
tight to hold the water, there is an allusion in Jeremiah ii, 13. Le Comte, 
mentions them. When limited quantities of water were required at a 
distance, at places situated higher than its source, it was often carried in 
vessels suspended from a yoke, and borne across the shoulders. This 
mode is still practised. In the plains of Damar in Arabia, water is drawn 
from deep wells, and thus carried to the fields. Dr. Shaw observes of 
the country of the Benni Mezzah, (in ancient Mauritania) it has no rivu- 
lets, "but is supplied altogether with well water." "Persia," says 
Fryer, "is chiefly beholden to wholesome springs of living water to 
quench the thirst of plants as well as living creatures." This method is 
pursued by the Hindoos, Japanese, Chinese, Javanese, Tartars, &c. in 
watering those terraces which they construct and cultivate on the sides of 
mountains. 

" The Chinese," says Le 
Comte, "have everywhere in 
Xensi and Xansi, for want of 
rain, certain pits from twenty 
to a hundred and twenty feet 
deep, from which they draw 
water by an incredible toil to 
irrigate their land." That the 
mode of carrying water to the 
fields by the yoke, was prac- 
tised in Egypt in ancient times, 
appears from the figures, No. 
27, copied from sculptures at 
Beni Hassan, the oldest monu- 
ments extant in that country. One of these wooden yokes, was found at 




No. 27. Egyptians watering land with Pots and Yoke. 



a See Shaw's Trav. 403, 412 ; Univer. Hist. Vol. i, 205 ; and our remarks on the 
Noria. in Chap. XIV. 



J4 



Hindoo Water Carrier. 



[Book 1. 



Thebes, with leather straps and bronze buckles, and is now preserved in 
England. The yoke is about three feet seven inches long, and the straps, 
which are double, about sixteen inches. Some yokes had from four to 
eight straps, according to the purposes for which they were intended. 
Wilk. An. Egypt, vol. ii, 138. 

As watering the land has always been the staple employment in Egypt, 
there can be little doubt, that the Israelites were employed in this service. 
We are informed, " their lives were made bitter unto them by hard bon- 
dage, in mortar and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field?' 
A.nd in Deuteronomy, xi, 10, irrigating the land, is expressly mentioned 
as one of their labors. In Leviticus, they are reminded that it was God 
who brought them out of Egypt, and delivered them from slavery, who 
broke the bands of their yoke and made them go upright; alluding to 
the stooping posture consequent on the long continued use of the yoke ; 
and in case of disobedience, they were threatened with subsequent thral- 
dom, to " serve their enemies in hunger and nakedness, and with a yoke 
on their necks j" a literal description of them when thus employed in 
watering the lands of their oppressors. A passage in the 81st Psalm, ap- 
pears to refer expressly to their deliverance from this, and another labo- 
rious method of watering the soil. "I removed his shoulder from the 
burden, his hands were delivered from the pots." The severity of this 
labor, may be inferred from that of Chinese peasants, who carrying bur- 
dens like the Egyptians, have deep impressions worn on their shoulders 
by the yoke. Osbeck ? s Voy. i, 252. 

It was a common custom of old to employ slaves and prisoners of war, 
in watering and working the land. Herodotus, i, 66, observes of the 
Lacedemonians, that after the death of Lycurgus, they invaded the Te- 
geans, and carried with them a quantity of fetters to bind their enemies; 
but they were themselves defeated, and loaded with their own fetters, 
were employed in the fields of the Tegeans: and Joshua, in accordance 
with this custom, made the captive Gibeonites 'hewers of wood and 
drawers of water.' Isaiah alludes to the same, lx, 5 : strangers shall 
stand &ia&feed your flocks, and the sons of the alien shall be your plough- 
men and your vine dressers. 

This figure represents a modern la- 
borer of Hindostan, and it will serve 
also to represent those of China and 
other Asiatics, who carry water to their 
gardens and fields in precisely the same 
way. It will be perceived that the 
form of the vessels is similar to that 
of the old Egyptian Pots in the pre- 
ceding figure, and that both of them 
serve to corroborate our views respect- 
ing the origin of the forms of these, 
and other domestic vessels of capacity. 
There is another mode of carrying 
water, which was anciently practised, 
but of which we do not remember to 
have seen any particular notice. It is represented in Plates 50, and 75. 
Pitt. Storia Dell' Arte. A conical vessel bent like the horn of an ox, is 
borne on the shoulder, the large and open end projecting in front, so that 
the bearer could discharge any part of its contents, by inclining it, which, 
in one figure is effected by means of a cord going round it, and one end 
held in the hand. These vessels are figured as large as the bodies of 




No. 23. Hindoo Water Carrier. 



Chap. 11.] Egyptian Mental. 85 

those who carry them, and appear to have been formed of staves, and 
.hooped. 

As an evidence of the antiquity of watering land with pots, we may re- 
fer to one of the constellations, to " Aquarius" or the " Water Pourer," a 
figure which was adopted as an expressive emblem of that season, when 
rains descended, and the lands were irrigated by nature alone. Although 
it may possibly be true, as some authors suppose, that some of the present 
signs of the Zodiac were substituted for more ancient ones at some period 
of time, posterior to the Argonautic expedition — (see Goguet's Disserta- 
tion on the names and figures of the constellations — Origine des Loix, 
Tom. ii.) there are others, and among them the "Water Pourer," which 
are for any thing known to the contrary, original figures, adopted by the 
first cultivators of astronomical knowledge, i. e. by the antediluvian sons 
of Seth, who, according to Josephus, were the " inventors of that pecu- 
liar sort of wisdom which is concerned with the heavenly bodies and their 
order ;" (Ant. B. i, chap. 2.) and which signs were continued by their 
successors, the Chaldeans, in the first ages after the flood, and have re- 
mained, unaltered to our days. The extreme antiquity of astronomy, and. 
its connection with agriculture, are undoubted, of which we shall meet with 
other examples besides the one just given. This connection was the 
source of the great mass of symbolical imagery which pervades the his- 
tory, mythology, and almost every thing connected with the remote an- 
cients ; most of which is so perplexing to decipher, and the greater part 
of which has defeated all attempts of the moderns satisfactorily to explain. 
In the time of Job, who is supposed to have lived before Moses, the 
constellations were well known. " Canst thou bind the sweet influences 
of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion," xxxviii, 31. " Which maketh 
Arcturus, Orion and Pleiades, and the chambers of the south." ix, 9. In- 
deed, M. Bailey and others have admitted that the astronomy of Chaldea, 
India, and Egypt, is but the wreck of a great system of astronomical sci- 
ence, which was carried to a high degree of perfection in the early ages 
of the world. 

When water is only required to be raised two or three feet from a 
tank or river, a vessel suspended by four cords, and worked by two men, 
is very extensively used in the east. In Egypt it is named the " Mental," 
the figure of which is copied from Grande Description. 




No. 29. Egyptian Mental. 

A small trench is dug on the edge of the river, on the borders of which 
two men stand opposite each other. They hold in each hand a cord, the 
ends of which are attached to a basket of palm leaves covered with leather. 
After launching it into the water, they lean backwards so as to be half 



S6 Various Arts of [Book 1 

seated on small mounds of earth raised for the purpose, by which the 
weight of the body assists in raising the load, as it is swung towards the 
gutter or basin formed on the bank to receive it. The movements cf the 
men are regulated by chanting, a custom of great antiquity, and adopted 
in all kinds of manual labor where more than one person were engaged. 

Sonnerat has figured and described (Vol. ii, 132,) a similar contrivance 
of the Hindoos. " They use a basket for watering, which is made 
impenetrable with cow dunjg and clay ; it is suspended by four cords ; two 
men hold a cord in each hand, draw up the water, and empty it in balan- 
cing the basket." Mr. Ward says this machine is commonly used in the 
south of Bengal to water the land. Hist. Hindoos, 92. Travelers in 
China have noticed it in use there. " Where the elevation of the bank 
over which water is to be lifted is trifling, they sometimes adopt the fol- 
lowing simple method. A light water-tight basket or bucket is held sus- 
pended on ropes between two men, who, by alternately tightening and re- 
laxing the ropes by which they hold it between them, give a certain 
swinging motion to the bucket, which first fills it with water, and then 
empties it by a jerk on the higher level ; the elastic spring which is in the 
bend of the ropes, serving to diminish the labor." Davis' China, Vol. ii, 
358. Chinese Repos. Vol. iii, 125. Sir George Staunton also described it, 
with an engraving ; by which it appears the Chinese do not use a bank of 
earth or any other prop, like the Egyptians, to support them in their la- 
bor. Osbeck has noticed a peculiar feature in working these baskets. He 
says Chinese laborers twist the cords as they lower the vessel, and when 
it is raised, the untwisting of them, overturns it and discharges the contents. 
This mode of raising water in China, was noticed by Gamelli, in 1695, 
although not particularly described by him : he says " the Chinese draw 
up water in a basket, two men working at the rope." 

Of all employments in ancient and modern Egypt, this may be consi- 
dered the most laborious and degrading. The wretched peasants, naked 
or nearly so, may be seen daily, from one end of Egypt to the other, in 
the exercise of this severe labor. " I have seen them," says Volney, 
" pass whole days thus drawing water from the Nile, exposed naked to 
the sun, which would kill us." To this mode of raising water there is 
probably an allusion in the latter clause of the passage already quoted 
from the 81st Psalm : " His hands were delivered from the pots," or 
" baskets" as the word is sometimes translated, and is so in this instance 
in the margin of the common English version. Indeed, it was peculiarly 
appropriate that a Psalm, written as this was, to celebrate the deliverance 
of the Israelites from Egyptian bondage, should allude to some of the 
severest tasks imposed upon them while under it. Raising of water to 
irrigate the land was emphatically " the labor of Egypt," from which 
they were freed. 



Some additional remarks to those on page 81, respecting other arts and 
customs delineated on Egyptian monuments, may interest some readers. 

Salting fish seems to have been a regular profession in ancient Egypt, 
and by processes similar to those now in use ; although it was not till the 
15th century that the art was known in modern Europe, when William 
Bukkum, a Dutchman, who died in 1447, " found out the art of salting, 
smoking, and preserving herrings." It is also not a little singular that the 
Egyptians had a religious rite, in which, as in modern Lent, every person 
ate fish. They used the spear, hook and line ; drag, seine and other nets. 
Part of a net, with leads to sink it, has been found at Thebes. Wealthy 
individuals had private fish-ponds, in which they angled. They hunted 



Chap. 11.] the Egyptians. 87 

with dogs ; and also with the lion, which was tamed for that purpose. 
The noose or lasso, and various traps, were common. Cattle were 
branded with the names of their owners. In taking birds, they had decoys 
and nets, like modern fowlers. Beer was an Egyptian beverage* and 
onions a favorite esculent — these were as superior in taste to ours, as in 
the elegance of the bunches in which they were tied. At feasts they had 
music and dancing, castanets, and even the pirouette of Italian and French 
artistes. They had 'grace* at meals; and wore wreaths of flowers and 
nosegays. Essences in bottles and ointments, the odor of some of which 
remains. The ladies wore neck-laces formed of beads of gold, glass, 
and of precious stones, and even of imitation stones. In dress they had 
cotton and linen cloths : some of the latter were so fine as to be compared 
to ivoven air, through which the person was distinctly seen ; and the former 
of patterns similar to those of modern calicos. Ezekiel speaks of " fine 
linen with broidered work from Egypt ;" and in Exodus it is often men- 
tioned. They had tissues of silver and gold, and cloth formed wholly of 
the latter. In furniture, carpets and rugs : one of the latter was found at 
Thebes, having figures of a boy and a goose wrought on it. Toilet boxes 
inlaid with various colored woods, and ornamented with ivory and golden 
studs. Sofas, chairs, stools and ottomans, all imitated in modern articles. 
Bedsteads enclosed in mosqueto nets; and pillows, the latter of wood, the 
material of which they were formerly made in Europe. Inlaid works of 
gold, silver, and bronze. Vases of elegant forms and elaborate workman- 
ship : great numbers of these are represented among the varieties of tribute 
carried by foreigners to Thothmes III, in whose reign the Israelites left 
Egypt. Door-hinges and bolts of bronze, similar to the modern ; scale- 
beams, enameling. Gold-beating and gilding. Gold and silver wire; some 
specimens are flattened with the hammer, others are believed to have been 
drawn. Vessels with spouts like those of our tea-kettles : one of the best 
proofs of skill in working sheet metal. 

Glass blowers are represented at work, and vessels identical with our 
demijohns and Florence flasks have been found, and both protected with 
reed or wicker work — besides, pocket bottles covered with leather, and 
other vessels of glass, cut, cast and blown. Goldsmiths in their shops 
are shown, with bellows, blow-pipes, crucibles and furnaces; golden bas- 
kets of open work; solder, hard and soft, the latter an alloy of tin and 
lead. Stone cutting; the form of the mallet the same as ours. Chisels of 
bronze; one found, is nine and a quarter inches long, and weighs one 
pound twelve ounces — its form resembles those now in use. Wheel- 
wrights and carriage makers at work; from which it is ascertained that 
the bent or improved carriage pole of modern days, was in use upwards 
of three thousand years ago. Carpenters' and cabinet makers' shops, are 
represented; from which and from specimens of work extant, we learn 
that dovetailing and doweling, glue and veneering were common. Adzes, 
saws, hatchets, drills and bows, were all of bronze. Models of boats. 
The leather cutter's knife had a semicircular blade, and was identical with 
the modern one. Shoe and sandal makers had straight and bent awls; 
the latter was supposed to have been a modern invention — the bristle at 
the end of a thread does not seem to have been used, as one person is 
seen drawing the thread through a hole with his teeth. Lastly, Egyptian 
ladies wore their hair plaited and curled; they had mirrors, needles, pins, 
and jewelry in great abundance; they had fans and combs; one of the 
latter has teeth larger on one side than on the other, and the centre is carved 
and was probably inlaid. Their children had dolls and other toys; and 
the gentlemen used walking canes and wore wigs, which were common., 



88 



Single and Double Gutters. 



[Book I 



CHAPTER XII . 



Gutters : Single do. — Double do. — Jantu of Hindostan : Ingenious mode of working it — Referred to 
a Deuteronomy — Other Asiatic machines moved in a similar mannner — Its Antiquity. Combination of 
levers and gutters — Swinging or Pendulum Machine — Rocking gutters — Dutch Scoop — Flash Wheel. 

Most of the machines hitherto noticed, raise water by means of flexi- 
ble cords or chains, and are generally applicable to wells of great depth. 
We now enter upon the examination of another variety, which, with one 
exception, (the chain of pots) are composed of inflexible materials, and 
raise water to limited heights only. Another important distinction be- 
tween them is this — In preceding machines, the 'mechanical powers' are 
distinct from the hydraulic apparatus, i. e. the wheels, pulleys, windlass, 
capstan, &c. form no essential part of the machines proper for raising the 
water, but are merely employed to transmit motion to them ; whereas 
those we are now about to describe, are made in the form of levers, 
wheels, &c. and are propelled as such. The following figure, represents 
one of the earliest specimens. 




open end of which 
be elevated ; the other 



No. 30. Single Gutter, 

It is simply a trough or gutter, the 
bank, over which the water is to 

closed is plunged into the liquid, and then raised till its contents are dis- 
charged. It forms what is called a lever of the second order, the load 
being between the fulcrum and the power. 



rests on the 
end being 




No. 31. Double Gutter. 

This figure represents an improvement, being a double gutter, or two 
of the former united and placed across a trough or reservoir designed to 
receive the water. A partition is formed in the centre, and two openings 
made through the bottom on each of its sides, through which the water 
that is raised escapes. The machine is worked by one or more men, 
who alternately plunge the ends into tho water, and consequently pro- 



Chap. 12.] TheJantu. 89 

duce a continuous discharge. Sometimes, openings are made in the bot- 
tom next the laborers, and covered by flaps, to admit the water without 
tlie necessity of wholly immersing those ends. Machines of this kind are 
described by Belidor, but he has not indicated their origin. From their 
simplicity, they probably date from remote antiquity. They are obviously, 
modifications of the Jantu of Hindostan and other parts of Asia, and 
were perhaps carried to Europe, (if not known there before) among other 
oriental devices, soon after a communication with that country was opened 
by the Cape of Good Hope. 

THE JANTU. 

The jantu is a machine extensively used in Bengal and other parts 
of India, to raise water for the irrigation of land, and is thus described by 
by Mr. Ward, in his History of the Hindoos. "It consists of a hollow 
trough of wood, about fifteen feet long, six inches wide, and ten inches 
deep, and is placed on a horizontal beam lying on bamboos fixed in the 
bank of a pond or river. One end of the trough rests upon the bank, 
where a gutter is prepared to carry off the water, and the other end is 
dipped in the water, by a man standing on a stage, plunging it in with his 
foot. A long bamboo with a large weight of earth at the farther end of 
it, is fastened to the end of the jantu near the river, and passing over 
the gallows before mentioned, poises up the jantu full of water, and 
causes it to empty itself into the gutter. This machine raises water three 
feet, but by placing a series of them one above another, it may be raised 
to any height, the water being discharged into small reservoirs, suf- 
ficiently deep to admit the jantu above, to be plunged low enough to fill 
it." Mr. Ward observes, that water is thus conveyed over rising ground 
to the distance of a mile and more. In some parts of Bengal, they have 
different methods of raising water, " but the principle is the same." 

There is in this apparently rude machine, a more perfect application of 
mechanical science, than would appear to a general observer. As the ob- 
ject of the long bamboo lever is to overcome the weight of the water, it 
might be asked, why not load the end of the jantu itself, which is next 
the bank sufficiently for that purpose, and thereby avoid the use of this 
additional lever, which renders the apparatus more complex, and appa- 
rently unnecessarily so X A little reflection will develope the reasons that 
led to its introduction, and will at the same time furnish another proof of 
oriental ingenuity. As the position of the jantu is nearly horizontal 
when it discharges the water, if the end were loaded as proposed, it would 
descend on the bank with an increasing velocity ; for the weight would 
be at the end of a lever which virtually lengthened as it approached the 
horizontal position ; and this effect would be still further augmented by 
the resistance of the water diminishing as the jantu rose, that is, by its 
flowing towards the centre — the consequence would be, that the violent 
concussions, when thus brought in contact with the bank, would speedily 
shake it to pieces. Now this result is ingeniously avoided by the lever 
and its weight. Thus, when the laborer has plunged the end of the jan- 
tu next him into the water, this lever (as we suppose, for we have not 
seen a figure of it) is placed, so as to be nearly in a horizontal position, by 
which its maximum force is exerted at the precise time when it is re- 
quired, i. e. when the jantu is at its lowest position and full of water ; 
and as the latter ascends, the loaded end of the lever descends, and its 
force diminishing, brings the end of the jantu gradually to rest. A 
somewhat similar effect might be produced, by making the load on the le- 

12 



90 The Jantu. [Book I. 

ver descend into the water, especially if its specific gravity varied but 
little from that fluid. Traits like this, which are often found in ancient 
devices, are no mean proofs of skill in the older mechanicians ; and as 
professors of the fine arts, discover the works of masters by certain char- 
acteristic touches, and by the general effect of a painting or sculpture — so 
professors of the useful arts may point to features like the above, as proofs 
that they bear the impress of the master mechanics of old. 

At what period in the early history of our species this class of ma- 
chines was first devised, can only be conjectured ; they are evidently of 
very high antiquity ; this is inferable not only from their simplicity, ex- 
tensive use over all Asia — where it may be said, machines for raising wa- 
ter have never changed — but also from the mode of working them, by the 
feet. Every one acquainted with the bible, knows that numerous opera- 
tions were thus performed. The juice of grapes was expressed by men 
treading them ; and the tombs of Egypt contain sculptures representing 
this and other operations. Mortar was mixed and clay prepared for the 
potter by the feet. The Chinese work their mangles by the feet ; and 
both they and modern Egyptians, and Hindoos, move a variety of other 
machines by the same means : among these are several for raising water, 
as the Picotah of Hindostan, (described in the next chapter,) the chain 
pump of China, and we may here remark, that all the machines for raising 
water described by Vitruvius, with one exception, were propelled by the 
feet, or as expressed in the English translation, by the " treading of men " 
It is not at all improbable, that to the Jantu, Moses alluded when descri- 
bing to his countrymen the land to which he was leading them : " A land 
of hills and valleys," that " drinketh water of the rain of heaven," where 
they should not be employed, as in Egypt, where rain was generally un- 
known, in the perpetual labor of raising it to irrigate the soil : " For the 
land whither thou goest in to possess it, is not as the land of Egypt from 
whence ye came out, where thou sowedst thy seed, and wateredst it with 
thy foot" Deut. xi, 10. Some authors suppose this passage refers to the 
oriental custom of opening and closing the small channels for water, that 
intersect the fields ; but this trifling labor would scarcely have been men- 
tioned by Moses, as constituting an important distinction between the two 
countries. It was in fact common to both. It is much more probable 
that he referred to the severe and incessant toil of raising water, to which 
they had been subject in Egypt, and which would be in a great degree 
superseded in Canaan by the " rain of heaven." He could not possibly 
have pointed out to them, a more encouraging feature of the country to 
which they were migrating. 

A very interesting proof that the Egyptians in the time of Moses did 
propel machines by the feet, has recently been brought to light. In one 
of the tombs at Thebes, which bears the name of Thothmes III. there 
is a sculptured representation of some Egyptian bellows which were thus 
worked. We shall have occasion to refer to them when we come to in- 
quire into the history of the pump, in the third book. This mode of 
transmitting humar energy appears to have been quite a favorite one in 
ancient times ; for the purpose of illustration we will describe one which 
is identical with the Jantu ; and is moreover one of the most common im- 
plements connected with ancient and modern agriculture in the east : " The 
Pedal," says Mr. "Ward, " is a rough piece of wood, generally the trunk 
of a tree, balanced on a pivot, with a head something like a mallet ; it is 
used to separate rice from the husk, to pound brick dust for buildings, &c. 
A person stands at the further end, and with his feet presses it down, 
which raises up the head, after which he lets it fall on the rice or brick. 



Chap. 12.] Combination of Gutters and Levers. 91 

"One of these pedals is set up at almost every house in country places." 
This primitive implement is also in general use in the agricultural districts 
of China. " The next thing," says a writer in the Chinese Repository, 
Vol. iii, 233, "is to divest the grain of the husk; this is done by pounding 
it in stone mortars ; two of these are placed in the ground together, and 
have corresponding pestles of wood or stone attached to long levers. A 
laborer by alternately stepping upon each lever pounds the grain, &c." 
Paper mills of the Chinese, by which the shreds of bamboo and the fa- 
rina of rice are reduced to a pulp, are precisely the same, and worked by 
men treading on levers as in the jantu. a And we may add, that the paste 
of which Macaroni is made, is kneaded by a similar implement, and which 
the Romans probably received from the east 

Hence it appears that the jantu is merely one of a class of machines 
of similar construction and moved in the same manner ; and as the pedal 
of the Hindoos is supposed to be as old as their agriculture, the jantu 
may certainly be considered equally ancient, for it is the more important 
machine of the two. They both, however, appear to have had a com- 
mon origin ; and to have come down together through the long vista of 
past ages, without the slightest alteration. The fact of the jantu being 
still used in India proves its antiquity, for it is well known that the Hin- 
doos retain the same customs and peculiarities that distinguished their an- 
cestors thousands of years ago. "A country," says Dr. Robertson, " where 
the customs, manners, and even dress of the people, are almost as perma- 
nent and invariable as the face of nature itself." This attachment to an- 
cient customs exists with singular force in regard to every thing con- 
nected with their agriculture. Like the Chinese and some other people of 
the east, nothing can induce them to deviate from the practice of their 
forefathers, either as it regards their implements or modes of cultivation. 
And when we bear in mind, that the Hindoos were among the earliest of 
civilized people ; that it was their arts and their science which enlightened 
the people, who, in the early ages dwelt in the valley of the Nile ; we 
can readily admit that the jantu was used, in the time of Moses, and 
that to it he alluded in the passage already quoted ; but, be this as it may, 
it may safely be considered as a fair specimen of primeval ingenuity in 
applying human effort, as well as in raising water ; and in both respects is 
entitled to the lengthened notice we have given it. 

These machines when worked by the feet raise water only about three 
feet, but where the elevation is greater, they have been moved by the 
hands, by means of ropes and a double lever, as in the next figure ; the open 
ends being attached by pins to the edge of the reservoir. In this manner 
water may be raised five or six feet at a single lift, according to the length 
of the gutter. 

Contrivances of the kind were formerly used in Europe ; and, as m the 
eastern world, series of them were sometimes employed to raise wa- 
ter to great elevations, to the top of buildings, &c. They are figured 
and described in Serviere's collection. A number of cisterns are placed at 
equal distances above each other from the ground to the roof. In these, 
gutters are arranged as in the figure ; the lowermost raises water into the 
first, into which others dip and convey it to the next one, and so to the 
highest. In some, the gutters are worked by a combination of levers ; in 
others, by ropes passing over pulleys at the highest part of the building and 
united to a crank that is attached to a water wheel or other first mover 

a Breton's China, Vol. ii, 39, and Vol. iv, 27. 



02 



Pendulum Machine. 



[Book L 



Various forms of the gutters are figured, (the heads of some like large 
bowls,) as well as modes of working them. See figure No. 32. 




No. 32. Combination of Levers and Gutters. 

There is another modification of the jantu, by which water may be 
raised to great elevations. A number of gutters, open at both ends, are 
permanently connected to, and over each other, in a zigzag direction, so 
that while one end of the lowest dips in the water, its other end inclines 
upwards at an angle proportioned to the length of the gutter and the 
motion to be given to it, and is united to the lower end of the next one, 
which also inclines upwards, but in an opposite direction, and is united to 
the next, and so on, the length of each diminishing as it approaches the 
tot), as in the following figure. 




No. 33. Pendulum or Swinging Gutters. 

In the bottom of each, an opening is made and covered by a flap or 
valve to prevent the water, when once past through, from returning. AU 



Chap. 12.] 



Dutch Scoop. 



93 



the gutters are secured to a frame of wood which is suspended on a pin 
se.cured to a beam, so that by pulling the cords alternately the whole may 
be made to oscillate like a pendulum. Thus, when pulled to one side, 
one of the lowest gutters dips into water, and scoops up a portion of it, 
to facilitate which the end is curved ; and as it rises, the liquid runs along 
to the farther end, and passing through the valve is retained till the mo- 
tion is reversed, when it flows down to the next gutter, and passing through 
its valve, is again continued in the same manner to the next ; entering at 
every oscillation the gutter above, till it reaches the highest ; and from 
which it is discharged into a reservoir, over which the last one is made to 
project. A double set of gutters, as shown in the figure, was sometimes 
attached to the same frame, so that a continuous stream could be discharg- 
ed into the reservoir. Machines like the above are more ingenious than 
useful. They do not appear to have ever been extensively used, although 
they are to be found in the works of several old writers on hydraulics. 
The one represented by the figure is described by Belidor as the inven- 
tion of M. Morel, who raised water by it 15 or 16 feet. Similar machines 
were known in the preceding century. A pendulum for raising water is 
described at page 95, of the first volume of machines approved by the 
French Academy, and at page 205, is a " hydraulic machine" by A. De 
Courdemoy, similar to the one we have copied ; except that square tubes 
were used instead of open gutters ; they were also of equal length, and 
attached to a rectangular frame, but were suspended and worked in the 
same manner as No. 33. 

A different mode of working these machines, was devised by an Eng- 
lish engineer. Instead of suspending the frame like a pendulum, he 
made the lower part terminate in rockers like those of a cradle ; these 
resting on a smooth horizontal plane, a slight impulse put the whole in 
motion. The lowest gutters at each oscillation dipped into the water, and 
raised a portion, as in the preceding figure. 




No. 34. Dutch Scoop. 

Among other simple devices, is the Dutch scoop, frequently used by 
that people in raising water over low dykes. It is a kind of box-shovel 



94 The Swape. [Book 1. 

suspended by cords from a triangular frame, and worked as represented 
in the figure. By a sweeping movement, an expert laborer will throw 
up at each stroke, a quantity of water equal to the capacity of the shovel, 
although from its form, such a quantity could not be retained in it. 

The Flash Wheel, is another contrivance to raise large quantities of wa- 
ter over moderate heights, being extensively used in draining wet lands, 
particularly the fens of England. It is made just like the wheel of a steam- 
boat, and when pat in rapid motion, generally by a windmill, it pushes 
the water up an inclined shute, which is so curved, that the paddles may 
sweep close to it, and consequently drive the liquid before them. The 
'back water' thrown up by the paddle wheels of steam vessels is raised 
in & somewhat similar manner. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

The Swape : Used in modern and ancient Egypt — Represented in sculptures at Thebes — Alluded to 
by Herodotus and Marcellus — Described by Pliny — Picotah of India ; agility of the Hindoos in working 
it. Chinese Swape — Similar to the machines employed in erecting the pyramids — The Swape, seen in 
Paradise by Mahomet — Figure of one near the city of Magnesia — Anglo Saxon Swape — Formerly used 
in English manufactories — Figures from the Nuremburgh Chronicle, Munster's Cosmography, and Bes- 
son's Theatre des Instrumens. The Swape common in North and South America — Examples of its use 
in watering gardens — Figures of it, the oldest representations of any hydraulic machine — Mechanical 
speculations of Ecclesiastics : Wilkins' projects for aerial navigation — Mechanical and theological pur- 
suits combined in the middle ages — Gerbert — Dunstan — Bishops famous as Castle architects— Androides — 
Roode of grace — Shrine of Becket — Speaking images — Chemical deceptions — Illuminated manuscripts. 

Of machines for raising water, the Swape has been more extensively 
used in all ages, and by all nations, than any other. Like most im- 
plements for the same purpose, its application is confined within certain 
limits ; but these are such as to render it of general utility. The mental 
or swinging basket, and the jantu, raise the liquid from two to three 
feet only at a lift, while the swape elevates it from five to fifteen, and in 
some cases still higher. It is not, however, well adapted for greater eleva- 
tions ; a circumstance which accounts for its not having been much used 
in the wells of ancient cities — their depth rendered it inapplicable, as the 
generality of ours do at this day. In Egypt, this machine is named the 
Shadoof, and in no country has it been more extensively employed. In 
modern days, more persons are there engaged in raising water by it and 
the mental, than are to be found in any other class of Egyptian laborers. 
They raise the liquid at each lift about seven feet, and where it is re- 
quired higher, series of swapes are placed at pnyper distances above 
each other, in a similar manner as the Hindoos arrange the jantu, and 
as shown in the figure, (No. 35.) The lowermost laborer empties his 
vessel into a cavity or basin formed in the rock, or in soil rendered imper- 
vious to water, three or four feet above him, and into which the next one 
plunges his bucket, who raises it into another, and so on till it reaches the 
required elevation. M. Jomard, a says it is not uncommon to see from 
thirty to fifty shadoofs at one place, raising water one above another. At 
Esne, he saw twenty-seven Arabs on one tier of stages, working fourteen 



a G< ande Description. E. M. Tom. ii. Memoirs, Part 2, p. 780. 



Chap. 13.] 



Ancient Egyptian Swape. 



95 



double swapes, i. e. two on each frame, the bucket of one descending as 
the other rises. They were relieved every hour, so that fifty-four men were 
required to keep the machines constantly in motion. The overseer or 
task-master measured the time by the sun, and sometimes by a simple 
clepsydra or water-clock. 




E^ 



No. 35. Modern Egyptians using the Swape. 



[t is impossible to pass up the Nile in certain states of the river, without 
being surprised at the myriads of these levers, and at their unceasing move- 
ments; for by relays of men, they are often worked without intermission, 
both night and day. In Upper Egypt especially, where from the elevation 
of the banks they are more necessary, and of course more numerous, the 
spectacle is animating in a high degree, and cannot but recall to reflecting 
minds similar scenes in the very same places in past ages, when the popu- 
lation was greatly more dense than at present, and the country furnished 
grain for surrounding nations. In some parts, the banks appear alive with 
men raising water by swapes and the effect is rendered still more impress- 
ive by the songs and measured chantings of the laborers, and the incessant 
groans and creakings of the machines themselves. To the ancient custom 
of singing while raising water, there is an evident allusion in Isaiah, xii, 3 . 
Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation. 

The Arabs have a tradition 
that the shadoof was used in 
the times of the Pharaohs, and 
a proof that such was the fact, 
has recently been furnished by 
Mr. Wilkinson, (Vol. ii, 5,) who 
found the remains of one in an 
ancient tomb at Thebes ; in ad- 
dition to which they are repre- 
sented in sculptures which date 
from 1532 to 1550 B. C. a peri- 
od extending beyond the Exo- 
dus. No. 36 represents it as 
used at that remote period for 
the irrigation of land. 

No. 38. An Egyptian in the time of Moses raising water by the swape. From sculptures at Thebes. 




% Swape used by the Romans. [Book I. 

It appears to have formed one of a series, designed to raise water ovei 
the elevation feebly portrayed in the back ground, in precisely the same 
way that is now common in Egypt and in the east, and as shown in No. 35. 
The remark of a traveler that a Chinese seemed to him " an antediluvian 
renewed," might with equal propriety, be applied to a modern Arab 
raising water by this implement from the Nile ; and the figure, No. 36, 
might be taken as a probably correct representation of an antediluvian 
laborer engaged in the same employment. On comparing the last two 
cuts, the former having been sketched by Mr. Wilkinson, from life, but 
three years ago ; and the latter copied from sculptures that have been 
executed upwards of three thousand years, we see at once, that the swape 
has undergone as little change in Egypt, since the times of the Pharaohs, 
as the costume, if such it may be called, of the laborers themselves; in oth- 
er words both remain the same. The discovery of this implement among 
the sculptures of ancient Egypt tends to corroborate our views respecting 
the antiquity of other machines for the same purpose, and which like it are 
still in common use in the east. It also admonishes us not to reject as im- 
probable or fabulous, current oriental traditions ; since they are, as in the 
case of this machine, often, if not generally, founded in truth. 

The swape seems to be alluded to by Herodotus, vi, 119, as used in 
Persia in his time. He observes that Darius, the father of Xerxes, sent 
some captives to a certain distance from Susa, and forty furlongs from a 
well, the contents of which were " drawn up with an engine, to which a 
kind of bucket is suspended, made of half a skin ; it is then poured into 
one cistern and afterwards removed into a second." This appears to 
have been the shadoof of the Egyptians, as figured in No. 35, to which 
there is probably a reference also in Clio, 193, where he says the Assyri- 
ans irrigated their lands from the Euphrates " by manual labo?- and by 
hydraulic engines." Aristotle mentions the swape as in common use among 
the Greeks* Dr. Clarke says some of the wells of Greece were not 
deep, and pulleys were not used, only buckets with ropes of twisted herbs, 
and sometimes the water was raised by a ' huge lever, great stones being 
a counterpoise to the other end.' A circumstance connected with the 
overthrow of the Syracusans, and the death of Archimedes, in which the 
swape is referred to, may here be noticed. When the Roman vessels, at 
the siege of Syracuse were grappled by hooks and elevated in the air, 
by levers that projected over the walls of the city, their resemblance 
to vessels of water raised by the swape, was so striking, that Marcellus 
was wont to say, " Archimedes used his ships to draw water with." b This 
remark of the Roman general clearly shows that the swape was very fa- 
miliar to him and to his countrymen. But we are not left to circumstan- 
ces like this to infer its use among the Romans. Pliny expressly men- 
tions it among machines for raising water. As the passage is highly 
interesting, and as we shall have occasion to refer to it hereafter, it may 
as well be inserted here. It is in the fourth Chapter of the Nineteenth 
Book, " On Gardens :" " above all things there should be water at command, 
(if possible a river or brook running through it, but if neither can be ob- 
tained,) then they are to be watered with pit water, fed with springs; 
either dratvn up by plain poles, hooks, and buckets ; or forced, by pumps 
and such like, going with the strength of wind enclosed, or else weighed 
up with swipes and cranes." Holland's Trans. 

The Swape is extensively used over all Hindostan. " The peasants, 
morning and evening draw water out of wells by buffaloes or oxen, or 

* Bishop Wilkins on the lever. u Plutarch's life of Marcellus, Wrangham's notes. 



Chap. 13.] 



The Picotah. 



97 



else by a thwart post, poised with a sufficient weight at the extremity laid 
over one fixed in the earth ; the water is drawn by a bucket of goat's 
skin." a In some districts, the Hindoos have a mode of working the 
Swape, which, so far as we know, is peculiar to themselves. In Patna 
it is common, and the machine when thus propelled, is named the Picotah. 

" Near the well or tank, a piece 
of wood is fixed, forked at the 
top ; in this fork another piece of 
wood is fixed to form a swape, 
which is formed by a peg, and 
steps cut out at the bottom, that 
the person who works the ma- 
chine may easily get up and down. 
Commonly, the lower part of the 
swape is the trunk of a tree; to 
the upper end is fixed a pole, at 
the end of which hangs a leather 
bucket. A man gets up the steps 
to the top of the swape, and sup- 
ports himself by a bamboo screen 
erected by the sides of the ma- 
chine." He plunges the bucket 
into the water, and draws it up by 
his weight; while another person 
stands ready to empty it. In the 
volume of plates to the Pans edi- 
tion, 1806, of Sonnerat's Voyages, 
^ the machine is represented rather 
different from the above. The la- 
No. 37. Picotah of Hindostan. borer alternately steps on and off 
the swape, from a ladder or stage of bamboos erected on one side of it 
See plate 23, Sonnerat. 

The apparatus and mode of working it, is more fully described in the 
following extract from 'Shoberl's Hindostan in Miniature.' "By the side 
of the well a forked piece of wood, or even a stone, eight or ten feet 
high is fixed upright. In the fork, is fastened by means of a peg, a beam 
three times as long, which gradually tapers, and is furnished with steps 
like those of a ladder. To the extremity of this long beam, which is ca- 
pable of moving up and down, is attached a pole, to the end of which is 
suspended a large leather bucket. The other end being the heaviest, 
when the machine is left to itself, the bucket hangs in the air at the height 
of twenty feet; but to make it descend, one man, and sometimes two, 
mount to the middle of the beam, and as they approach the bucket, it 
sinks to the bottom of the well, and fills itself with water. The men then 
move back to the opposite end, the bucket is raised, and another man 
empties it into a basin. This operation is performed with such celerity 
that the water never ceases running, and you can scarcely see the man 
moving along his beam ; yet he is sometimes at the height of twenty 
feet, at others, touching the ground ; and such is his confidence, that he 
laughs, sings, smokes, and eats in this apparently ticklish situation." Vol. 
V, p. 22, 24. This mode of applying human effort, was eurly adopted in 
the working of pumps — a piston rod being attached to each end of the 
vibrating beam. Dr. Lardner, has inserted a figure of it in his popular 




Fryer's Travels in India, 187. 

13 



98 The Swape in Arabia. [Book L 

treatise on Pneumatics. It is figured in most of the old authors, and was 
most likely, copied from the Picotah, and other oriental machines, which 
have been propelled in a similar manner from very remote times. See 
Gregory's Median. Vol. ii, 312. Ed. 1815. 

The Swape is one of the ancient and modern implements of China, 
where it is used, as in Egypt and India, for the irrigation of land. It is 
frequently made to turn in a socket, (or the post itself moves round,) in 
addition to the ordinary vibratory motion. In several situations, this is a 
decided improvement, as the vessel of water when raised above the edge 
of a tank or river, can, if desirable, be swung round to any part of the 
circle which it describes. Sir George Staunton, has given a figure of it, 
which Mr. Davis has copied into his popular work on the Chinese. When 
thus constructed, it is according to Goguet, (Tom. hi, Origine des Loix,) 
identical with the engines mentioned by Herodotus, B. ii, 125, as em- 
ployed in the erection of the Egyptian pyramids; these, he supposes were 
portable swapes, or levers of the first order, with a rotary movement like 
those of the Chinese. A number of these being placed on the lowest 
tier of stones which formed the basis of the pyramids, were used to raise 
those which form the second tier; after which, other swapes were placed 
on the latter and materials raised by them for the third range, and in like 
manner to the top. This was the process which Herodotus says was 
adopted. M. Goguet, supposes that two swapes were employed in 
raising every stone, one at each end, and that the levers were depressed 
by a number of men laying hold of short ropes attached to them for that 
purpose. This mode appears to accord with the meagre description of the 
machines used in the erection of the pyramids, which the father of history 
has given. 

It has already been observed, that the engines employed by Archimedes 
to destroy the Roman ships in the harbor of Syracuse, were so analagous to 
the swape, as to elicit from Marcellus, an observation to that effect. In fact, 
machines similar to it, were used by ancient engineers both for attacking and 
defending cities. Vegetius, says they were used to raise soldiers to the tops 
of walls, &c. In the oldest translation of his work, (Erffurt, 1511,) there 
is a figure of it, which is identical with the Chinese swape, and with that 
which Goguet supposes was used by the old engineers of Egypt. Bar- 
baro, in his edition of Vitruvius, also figures it. In Rollin's 'Arts and 
Sciences of the Ancients,' are several examples and figures of it, applied 
to the purposes of war ; and among others to the destruction of the Ro- 
man vessels before Syracuse. 

A story in the ' Hegiat al Megiales' shews how common it was in Arabia 
in the seventh and preceding centuries. Mahomet in one of his visions 
of paradise, "saw a machine much used in the Levant for drawing 
water out of wells, called by the Latins Tollcns, and consisting of a long 
lever fixed on a post, [i.e. the swape.] Enquiring to whom it belonged, he 
was told it was Abougehel's, (the bitterest enemy to him and his religion.) 
Surprised at this, he exclaimed, ' what has Abougehel to do with paradise, 
he is never to enter there !' Shortly after, he understood the drift of the 
vision, for the son of his enemy became a Mussulman, upon which he ex- 
claimed ' Abougehel was the swape, by which God drew up his son from 
the bottom of the pit of infidelity.' " It is used by the Japanese ; and as fi- 
gured by Montanus, the bucket is raised by pulling down the opposite end 
of the lever by means of cords attached to it. 

In Fisher's " Constantinople, and the Scenery of the Seven Churches of 
Asia." Lon. 1839, is a beautiful view of the city of Magnesia near Mount 
Sipylus, in Asia Minor, a city founded by Tantalus, whose fabled punish- 



Chap. 13.] 



Anglo Saxon Swape. 



99 



meiit lias rendered his name notorious. In the foreground is represented 
the following figure of the swape, a machine which the writer observes, 

" forms a conspicuous object 
in every landscape in the east. 
One is seen erected in every 
garden, and as irrigation is 
constantly required in an 
arid soil, it is always in mo- 
tion, and its dull and drowsy 
creaking is the sound inces- 
santly heard by all travelers." 
In this figure we behold 
not merely a sketch of mo- 
dern Asiatic manners; but 
v one, which as regards rais- 
53'jifcJ ing of water; the machine 
pJSr by which it is effected ; 
M„ animals around it; costume 
"^ of the individuals ; and por- 
O traiture of rural life, — has 
'"r remained unchanged from 
^ times that reach back to the 
§• infancy of our race, and of 
x which history has preserved 
no records. 

[For this interesting cut, 
and for No. 35 also, I am in- 
debted to my friend William 
Everdell, Esq. who, be- 
undertook the task, to him a novel 




No. 38. Swape in Asia Minor. 



sides other contributions to this work 
one, of engraving them.] 

The swape has probably been in continual use in Great Britain, from 
the period of its subjugation by the Romans, if not before. It is there 
known under the various names of ' Swape,' ' Sweep' and in old authors, 
' Swipe' A figure of it, as used by the 
Anglo-Saxons, is here inserted, from 
Vol. i, of the ' Pictorial History of 
England,' copied from an ancient ma- 
nuscript in the British Museum. The 
costume of the female, her masculine 
figure, the shingled well, and form of 
the vase or pitcher, are interesting, as 
indicative of manners and customs, &c. 
of former ages. The arm of the lever to 
which the bucket is suspended, appears 
extremely short, but this is to be attri- 
buted to its defective representation. 
The following summary of ancient Brit- 
ish devices is from Fosbroke's Encyclo- 
pedia of Antiquities. " The Anglo- 
Saxons had a wheel for drawing water 
from wells. They were common annexations to houses, 
fixed to the chains of wells. We find a beam on a pivot, 
weight at one end for raising water. Wheels and coverings. A lever, 
the fulcrum of which was a kind of gallows over the well. Two 




No. 39. Anglo Saxon Swape. 



Rings were 
with a 



100 



Old German Swapes. 



[Book I. 



buckets one at each end of a chain adapted to a versatile engine called 
volgolus. Buckets with iron hoops, and drawing water from deep wells 
as a punishment." The swape appears to have been the principal ma- 
chine in England for raising water till quite recent times. In the 17th 
century it was used in manufactories, and is not yet, perhaps, wholly su- 
perseded by the pump. Bishop Wilkins, in speaking of the lever and its 
application by Archimedes in destroying the Roman fleet, says, " it was of 
the same form with that which is commonly used by brewers and dyers for 
the drawing of water. It consists of two posts, the one fastened perpen- 
dicularly in the ground, the other being jointed on cross to the top of it." 
Mathemat. Magic. B. i, Chaps. 4 and 12. This was published in 1638. In 
1736, Mr. Ainsworth published his celebrated Latin Dictionary, and un- 
der the word Rachdmus, ' a truckle or pulley used in drawing up water ;' 
he adds, "perhaps not unlike the sweep our brewers use:" hence at that 
time, it continued to be used for raising water and transferring liquids in 
English breweries and similar establishments, as remarked by "Wilkins one 
hundred years before. 

In Germany it was frequently, 
and still is, a prominent object in 
country towns and villages, as well 
as in farm yards. In the former it 
was frequently erected on, or at the 
end of bridges for the purpose of 
raising water from rivers and brooks. 
In the famous Nuremburgh Chronicle 
it is frequently figured. From a va- 
riety of different forms, we have 
selected No. 40, as a specimen. 

In the Cosmography of Sebastian 
Munster, 1550, it is represented at 
page 729, as employed for raising 
water to supply, by means of pipes, a neighboring town. Agricola, in 
his De Re Metallica, has also figured it. pp. 443 and 458. 




No. 40. Swape. From the Nuremburgh 
Chronicle. A. D. 1493. 




No. 41. Swape from S. Munster'8 Cosmography. 1550. 

The Swape was very common in France and the neighboring nations 
on the European continent, in the last and preceding centuries. It is 
named bascule in France. The old Dictionnairc de Treuoux, says : 

Les bascules les plus simple, sont celles qui ne consistent qu'en une 
piece de bois soutenue d'une autre par le milieu ou autrement, comme 
d'un essieu, pour 6tre plus au moins en equilibre. Lorsqu'on pese sur 



Chap. 13. 



Old French Swape. 



101 




No. 42. Swape from Besson. 1568. 



un des bouts l'autre hausse. Ces sortes de bascules sont les plus com- 
munes; on s'en sert pour elever des eaux. The last sentence is believed 
'to be applicable to every part of Europe at the present time, perhaps 
equally so as at any former period. 

We subjoin a description of one 
proposed by James Besson, a French 
mechanician, 270 years ago, by 
which two buckets, one at each end, 
may be used. As the vibration of 
the beam is ingeniously effected by 
a continuous rotary movement, a 
figure of it will be acceptable to the 
intelligent mechanic. 

The lever is suspended at the 
centre of its length, on a pin which 
passes through the lower part of the 
perpendicular post, the upper end 
of which is firmly secured to the 
frame and cross piece. A perpen- 
dicular shaft is placed immediately 
under the lower end of the post and 
in the same vertical line with it. The 
upper journal of the shaft enters and 
turns in the end of the post, while 
its lower one is received into a cavity 
in the block upon which it rests. This shaft forms the axis of an inverted 
cone of frame-work — a section of which, resembling an hyperbolic curve, 
acts as it revolves on the under side of the swape, and imparts to it the 
required movement. To lessen the friction, two long rollers are fixed to 
its under side, and upon these only does the curved edge of the cone act. 
The shaft may of course be turned by any motive power. In the figure, 
a horizontal water wheel is attached to the shaft, with oblique paddles 
which receive the impulse of the stream in which they are placed. This 
device may serve as an example of mechanical tact and resource in the 
early part of the 16th century, when practical mechanics began to be cul- 
tivated as a science. 

The swape is commonly used by the farmers on this continent, in the 
vicinity of whose dwellings it may be seen, more or less, from the St. 
Lawrence to the Mississippi. In some of the states, it still bears the old 
English name of the ' sweep' as in Virginia — in others it is named the 
1 balance pole.' It prevails in Mexico, Central America, Peru, Chili, and 
generally throughout the southern continent. There is some uncertainty 
respecting its having been known here before the arrival of Europeans in 
the 16th century. See remarks on Ancient American Machines in the 
last chapter of this book. 

The swape appears to have been used in all times, for watering gardens 
in the east, as already observed of Asia Minor, it is there seen erected in 
almost every one. No. 43 represents it employed in the gardens of 
Egypt during the sojourn of the Israelites in that country. The tree and 
plant are uniform hieroglyphical representations of gardens. 

The labourer discharges the contents of his bucket into a wood- 
en trough or gutter, by which the water is conveyed to the plants ; 
a mode still followed through all the east. To this application of the 
swape there is probably a reference in the prediction of Balaam, deliver- 
ed one hundred years after these figures were sculptured, ' he shall pour 



102 



Ancient Garden Swape. 



[Book 1. 



water out of his buckets, and his seed shall be in many waters, (Numb, 
xxiv, 7,) an intimation that the Israelites should possess a country, where 
this great desideratum should be in comparative abundance, a land " wa- 
tered as a garden of herbs." The figure may serve also to illustrate the 
' gutters and watering troughs' in which Jacob watered the flocks of La- 
ban, his father in law. Gen. xxx, 38. 




No. 43. Egyptian Shadoof employed in watering a garden. 1550, B. C. 

The luxuriance of vegetation in an eastern garden, (when properly water- 
ed,) the richness of its scenery, the beauty of its foliage and flowers, form 
one of the most enchanting prospects in nature ; hence it became the most 
favorite, as it was the most natural, metaphor of human felicity. When 
the prophets promised prosperity, it was in such language as the following : 
" Thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose 
waters fail not," and " their soul shall be as a watered garden." On the 
contrary, when the wicked were denounced, "ye shall be as an oak 
whose leaf fadeth, and as a garden that hath no water." The same me- 
taphor is a frequent one in ancient poets, and in most instances the use of 
the swape is implied. Thus Homer : 

As when autumnal Boreas sweeps the sky. 
And instant blows the watered gardens dry. 
And Ovid : 

As in a watered garden 1 s blooming walk. Met. x, 277. 

Pliny mentions it expressly for the same purpose, and to it Juvenal 
seems to allude in his third satire: 

There from the slwlloxo well your hand shall pour 
The stream it loves on every opening flower. 

This use of the swape is not now confined to the gardens of fallen Asia, 
Egypt and Greece, but it is employed by the most enlightened nations ; 
and in London and in Paris, as in Athens and Alexandria, Memphis and 
Thebes, this primitive implement has not been superseded. In Breton's 
China, Lon. 1834, the Chinese swape is described ; and the author ob- 
serves, " it is similar to those which are seen in the marltct gardens round 
London :" and in a more recent work, ' Scripture illustrated from Egypt- 
ian Antiquities,' the author speaking of the Egyptian swape, says, it is the 
same as used in the gardens of Brentford. 

Of the swape, it may be remarked, that the most ancient portraiture 
extant, of any hydraulic machine, is a sculptured representation of it, be- 
tween three and four thousand years old, and even at that remote period 



Chap. 13.1 Garden Sicape. 103 

it was in all probability a very old affair, and in common use. These 
sculptures moreover prove, that it has remained in Egypt unaltered in its 
form, dimensions, mode and material of its construction and methods of us- 
ing it, during at least thirty -four centuries ! and this, notwithstanding the 
political convulsions to which that country has ever been subject, since its 
conquest by Cambyses ; its inhabitants having been successively under 
the Persian, Grecian, Roman, Saracenic, and Turkish yoke, thus literally 
fulfilling a prophecy of Ezekiel, that, " there shall be no longer a prince 
of the land of Egypt," — a descendant of its ancient kings; yet through 
all these mighty revolutions that have swept over it like the fatal Simoon, 
and destroyed every vital principle of its ancient grandeur, this simple 
machine has past through them all unchanged, and is still applied by the 
inhabitants to the same purposes, and in precisely the same way, for which 
it was used by their more enlightened progenitors. 

We have seen it used by the Greeks and Romans, and we find it still 
in the possession of their descendants, wherever they dwell, as well as 
among those of more ancient people, the Hindoos, Arabs, and Chinese. 
And although we may be unable to keep it constantly in view in Europe, 
in those ages which immediately followed the fall of the Roman power, 
when the ferocious tyranny of the Saracens established a despotism over 
the mind as well as the body ; and by the characteristic zeal of Omar, 
entailed ignorance on the future, by consuming the very sources of know- 
ledge under the baths of Alexandria ; yet, when in the loth century, the 
human intellect began to shake off the lethargy, which during the long 
night of the dark ages had paralyzed its energies, and printing was intro- 
duced — that mighty art which is ordained to sway the destinies of our 
race forever — among the earliest of printed books, with illustrations, this 
interesting implement may be found portrayed in vignettes, in views of 
cities, and of rural life ; tangible proofs of its universal use throughout 
Europe at that time, as well as during the preceding ages. 



Having referred in this and in a preceding chapter, to the ' Mathematical 
Magic' of Wilkins, we subjoin some remarks on the mechanical specula- 
tions of that and other old church dignitaries. [These remarks were at 
first designed for a note, but have been too far extended to be inserted as 
one.] The former was certainly one of the most ingenious and imaginative of 
mechanics that ever was made a bishop of, and not a few have worn the 
mitre. ' The Right Reverend Father in God, John, Lord Bishop of 
Chester,' (like friars Bacon and Bungey, the Jesuit Kircher, the Abbe 
Mical, and a host of others,) excelled equally in mechanical and theologi- 
cal science ; and at one period of his researches in the former, seemed 
almost in danger of rendering the latter superfluous : viz. by developing 
a plan of conveying men to other worlds by machinery! See his Tract on 
on the 'Discovery of a New World in the Moon, and the possibility of 
a passage thither.' Lon. 1638. After removing with a facility truly de- 
lightful, those objections to such a 'passage' as arise from the 'extreme 
coldness and thinness of the etherial air,' 'the natural heaviness of a man's 
body,' and 'the vast distance of that place from us,' and the consequent 
necessity of rest and provisions during so long a journey, there being, as 
he observes, 'no inns to entertain passengers, nor any castles in the air to 
receive poor pilgrims' — he proposes three modes of accomplishing the 
object. 1. By the application of icings to the body; 'as angels are pic- 
tured, as Mercury and Daedalus are feigned, and as has been attempted 
by divers, particularly by a Turk in Constantinople, as Busbequius re- 



j. 04 Mechanical Speculations [Book I 

lates. 2. By means of birds, for as he quaintly says, "If there be such 
a great ruck in Madagascar, as Marcus Polus the Venetian mentions, the 
feathers in whose wings are twelve feet long, which can scoop up a horse 
and his rider, or an elephant, as our kites do a mouse ; why then, 'tis 
but teaching one of these to carry a man, and he may ride up thither, as 
Ganymede did, upon an eagle." 3. Or, "if neither of these ways will 
serve, yet I do seriously, and upon good ground, affirm it possible to make 
a flying chariot, in which a man may sit, and give such a motion unto it as 
shall convey him through the air ; and this perhaps might be made large 
enough to carry diverse men at the same time, together with food for 
their viaticum, and commodities for traffic." The construction of such a 
chariot, he says, was 'no difficult matter, if a man had leisure to show 
more particularly the means of composing it.' It is to be regretted that 
he did not pretermit some of his labors for that purpose, especially as his 
project was not merely to skim along the surface of this planet, like mo- 
dern aeronauts, or ancient navigators creeping along shores — but like ano- 
ther Columbus, to launch out into the unknown regions of space, in search 
of other worlds. 

Had Wilkins been a countryman as well as a contemporary of Galileo, 
his aerial flights would have been confined to a dungeon, and the wings 
of his genius would have been effectually clipped with Roman shears. 
Indeed we must admit that he was the greater sinner of the two! for 
Galileo merely taught the absurd doctrine of the sun's stability, and that 
the earth moved round it, in opposition to the evidence of his senses, to 
the doctrines of the church, and in flat contradiction of those passages in 
the Bible, which Bellarmine adduced as proofs indubitable, that the sun 
'rises up' in the east every morning, and 'goes down' in the west every 
night, and that the earth is established and 'cannot be moved.' Whereas 
the heretical bishop, endeavored to open a way by which men could 
visit other worlds when they pleased, and that too, without consulting, or 
so much as saying 'by your leave,' to the successors of St. Peter! 

The earliest English aeronaut was Elmer, a monk of the 11th century. 
He adapted wings to his hands and feet, and took his flight from a lofty 
tower. He sustained himself in the air for the space of a furlong, but his 
career, (like that of Dante in the fifteenth century) terminated unfortu- 
nately, for by some derangement of his machinery he fell, and both his 
legs were broken. Dante, after several successful experiments, fell on the 
roof of a church and broke his thigh. 

It is a singular fact in the history of the arts, that mechanical skill was 
in former times intimately connected with theological pursuits, and that 
some of the cleverest workmen were ecclesiastics, and of the highest 
grades too ; witness Gerbert, Dunstan, Albertus, and many others. The 
first was a French mechanician of the 10th century, whose researches 
led him at that early period, to experiment on steam, and on its application 
to produce music. He was successively archbishop of Rheims and Ra- 
venna, and in 999 took his seat in St. Peter's chair, and was announced 
to the world as Pope Sylvester II. It may now appear strange that 
monks and friars, abbots, bishops, archbishops and popes, should have been 
among the chief cultivators of, and most expert manipulators in the arts, 
and that to them we are greatly indebted for their preservation through 
the dark ages ; but, in those times, it was so far from being considered 
derogatory in ecclesiastics to work at ' a trade,' that those who did not, were 
accounted unworthy members of the church ; hence monks were cooks, 
carpenters, bakers, farmers, turners, founders, smiths, painters, carvers, 
copyists, &c. ; all had some occupation, besides the study of their peculiar 



Chap. 13.j of Ecclesiastics. 106 

duties. " In that famous colledg, our monasterie of Bangor, in which there 
were 2100 christian philosophers, that served for the profit of the people 
in Christ, living by the labor of their hands, according to St. Paul's doc- 
trine. " a This was in the 5th century, when Pelagius belonged to the 
same monastery. In the 7th, "almost all monks were addicted to manual 
arts," and according to St. Benedict, such only as lived by their own la- 
bor, "were truly monks." b "They made and sold their wares to strangers, 
for the use [benefit] of their monasterie, yet somewhat cheaper than others 
sold." c Many of these men naturally became expert workmen, especially 
in the metals — a branch of the arts that seems to have been a favorite one 
with them ; hence, the best gold and silver smiths of the times were often 
found in cloisters ; and the rich \ boles, cups, chalices, basens, lavatories 
of silver and gold, and other precious furniture' of the churches, were 
made by the priests themselves : — It may be a question, whether they 
were not right in thus combining mental and physical employments; as 
a compound being, manual labor seems necessary to the full development 
of man's intellect, and to its healthy and vigorous exercise. Dunstan, 
Archbishop of Canterbury in the 10th century, was skilled in metallurgical 
operations — he was a working jeweler, and a brass founder. Two large 
bells for the church at Abingdon were cast by him. He is said to have 
been the inventor of the Eolian harp, an instrument whose spontaneous 
music induced the people at that dark age, to consider him a conjurer — 
hence the old lines — 

St. Dunstan's harp, fast by the wall, 
Upon a pin did hang — a; 
The harp itself, with ty and all, 
Untouched by hand did twang — a. 

The genius of some led them to cultivate architecture. Cathedrals and 
other buildings yet extant, attest their skill. Of celebrated architects in 
the 11th century, were Mauritius, bishop of London, and Chtndulphus, 
bishop of Rochester. The latter visited the Holy Land previous to the 
crusades, and is said to have been one of the greatest builders, and the 
most eminent castle architect of his age. In the Towers of London and 
Rochester, he left specimens of his art. At page 62, we referred to the 
remains of a castle built by him, and to his mode of protecting the well, 
and raising the water to the different floors. In the 12th century, these 
reverend artists were numerous. In England, were Roger, bishop of 
Salisbury, and Ernulf, his successor — Alexander of Lincoln — Henry De 
Blois of Winchester, and Roger, of York ; all of whom left remarkable 
proofs of their proficiency as builders. In France, 'in sundry times the 
ecclesiastics performed carving, smelting, painting, and mosaic.' Leo, 
bishop of Tours in the 6th century, 'was a great artist, especially in car 
pentri/.' St. Eloy was at first a sadler, then a goldsmith, and at last 
bishop of Noyan ; he built a monastery near Limoges, but he was most 
noted for shrines of gold, silver, and precious stones. He died in 668. 
The church of Notre Dame des Unes, in Flanders, was begun by Pierre, 
the 7th abbot, and completed in 1262, by Theodoric. ' The whole church 
was built by the monks themselves, assisted by the lay brothers and their 
servants.'* 1 

Luther was accustomed to turning, and kept a lathe in his house, 'in 
order to gain his livelihood by his hands, if the word of God failed to 
support him.' 

a Monastichon Britannicum, Lon. 1655. p. 40. b lb. 263. c lb. 301 

d Ed. Encyc. Art. Civil Architecture. 

14 



106 Roode of Grace. [Book I 

Those in whom the ' organ of constructiveness,' or invention was prom- 
inent, produced among other curious machinery, speaking heads, images of 
saints, fyc. These, it is believed, were imitations of similar contrivances 
in heathen temples. The statue of Serapis moved its eyes and lips. The 
bird of Memnon flapped his wings, and uttered sounds. 51 It is to be re- 
gretted that no detailed descriptions of these, and of such, as were used 
in European churches previous to the reformation, have been preserved. 
An account of the ingenious frauds of antiquity would be as valuable to a 
mechanician as it would be interesting to a philosopher. It would in all 
probability develope mechanical combinations both novel and useful ; and 
would include all the mechanism of modern androides ; and most of the 
deceptions to be derived from natural magic. 

A famous image known as the Roode of Grace, is often mentioned by 
English historians. A few scattered notices of it are "worth inserting. 
Speed in his history of Great Britain, (page 790,) says " it was by divers 
vices [devices] made to bozo down, and to lift up itself e, to shake, and to 
stir both head, hands, and feet, to rowle its eyes, moove the lips, and to bend 
the brows." It was destroyed in Henry VIII's reign, being " broken and 
pulled in pieces, so likewise the images of our Lady of Walsingham 
and Ipswich, set and besprinkled with jewels, and gemmes, with divers 
others both of England and Wales, were brought to London, and burnt 
at Chelsea, before the Lord Crumwell." In the life of the last named in- 
dividual some further particulars of it are given, and which explain the 
mode of operation. " Within the Roode of Grace, a man stood inclosed 
with an hundred wyers, wherewith he made the image roll his eyes, nod his 
head, hang the lip, move and shake his jaws ; according as the value of 
the gift offered, pleased or displeased the priest ; if it were a small piece 
of silver, he would hang the lip, if it were a good piece of gold, his chaps 
would go merrily," &c. Cromwell discovering the cheat, caused the 
image " with all his engines to be openly showed at Paul's Cross, and 
there to be torn in pieces by the people." Clarke's Lives, Lon. 1675. 
It would have been a dangerous practice to have employed intelligent 
1 lay craftsmen' in making machines like this, or to have engaged them in 
' pulling the wires.' The shrine of Becket showed great proficiency in 
some of the arts. It " did abound with more than princely riches, its 
meanest part was pure gold, garnished with many precious stones, as 
Erasmus that saw it, hath written ; whereof the chiefest was a rich 
gemme of France, offered by king Leivis, who asked and obtained (you 
mav be sure, he buying it so deare) that no passenger betwixt Dover and 
Whitesand should perish by shipwra.cke." The bones of Becket were 
laid in a splendid tomb. " The timber work of his shrine was covered 
with plates of gold, damasked and embossed with wires of gold, garnished 
with brochcs, images, angels, precious stones, and great orient pearles ; all 
these defaced filled two chests, and were for price, of an unestimable 
value." A catalogue of the miracles wrought at his shrine filled two folio 
volumes ! b 

a Sec Kircher's Musurgia Universalis, Rome, 1C50, Tom ii, p. 413, for an ingenious 
figure of such an automaton. 

b Accounts kept by Churchwardens previous to the reformation often exhibit curious 
information in relation to the repairing, replacing, and clothing of images, and to the 
sale of damaged or worn out ones, as appears by the following extracts from ' A boake 
of the stuffe in the cheyrche of Holbeche sowld by Cheyrchewardyns of the same, ac- 
cording to the injunctyons of the Kynges Magyste, A. D. 1447.' The Trinity with the 
Tabernacle, sold for two shilling and fourpence. The Tabernacle of Nicholas and James 
for six shillings and eight pence. "All the Apostyls coats and other raggs," for eight shil- 
lings and four pence. And in 1547, " XX score" and X hund, oflatyn, at ii. s. and xi. d. 
the score." This item probably consisted of brazen utensils, images, &c. sold for thei/ 
value as old metal. Stukely's Antiquities- London 1770, page 21. 



Chap. 13.] Speaking Tubes. 107 

Other devices, less complex than the Roode of Grace, but when adroitly 
managed, equally effective and imposing, consisted in the application of se- 
cret tubes, through which sound might be conveyed from a person at a dis- 
tance. Sometimes the accomplice was concealed in the pedestal, or in the 
statue itself, or in the vicinity. " The craftinesse of the inchanters, (observes 
Peter Martyr,) led them to erect images against walles, and gave answer 
through holes bored in them ; wherefore the people were marvellouslie 
amazed when they supposed the images spake. There were dailie woon- 
ders wrought at the images whereby the sillie people were in sundriewise 
seduced. " a It was by a trick of this kind, that Dunstan confounded his 
adversaries in an important discussion — the crucifix hanging in the church 
opened its mouth and decided the question in his favor. Numerous exam- 
ples of more recent times might be given. We add one from Keysler's 
Trav. Vol. i, 14S : A monk having made a hole through a wall, behind an 
image of the Virgin, ' placed a concealed tube from it to his cell ; and through 
it caused the image to utter whatever he wished the people to believe.' By 
such tubes figures of the Virgin have repeatedly declared her wishes, 
saluted her worshippers, and returned their compliments. It was by the 
same device that several statues of heathen deities performed prodigies ; 
that of Jupiter for example, which burst forth into loud fits of laughter. 
Misson's Trav. Vol. ii, 412. 

Within ancient temples, says Fosbroke, was a dark interior, answering 
to the choir of modern cathedrals, the Penetrate, into which the people 
were not permitted to enter. When the time of sacrifice arrived, the 
priest opened the doors that the people might see the altar and -victim ; 
for only the priests and privileged persons entered into the cella, i. e. into 
interior. Some temples admitted light only at the door, for darkness was 
deemed a most powerful aid to superstition. " The penetrale of the tem- 
ple of Isis, at Pompeii is a small pavilion, raised upon steps, under which 
is a vault, that may have served for oracular impositions. A shrine of 
this kind is still open for inspection at Argos. In its original state it had 
been a temple ; the further part where the altar was, being an excavation 
of the rock, and the front and roof constructed of baked tiles. The altar 
yet remains and part of the fictile superstructure, but the most remarka- 
ble thing is a secret subterraneous passage terminating behind the alta* 
its entrance being at a considerable distance, towards the right of a person 
facing the altar, and so cunningly contrived as to have a small aperture, 
easily concealed, and level with the surface of the rock. T his was barely 
large enough to admit the entrance of a single person, who could creep 
along to the back of the altar, where being hid by some colossal statue, or 
other screen, the sound of his voice would produce a most impo- 
sing effect among the listening votaries." Antiq. 33. It is a curious 
fact that conjurers and chiefs among American Indians, were found 
to practice similar cheats. In St. Domingo, some Spaniards having 
abruptly entered the cabin of a cacique, they were astonished to hear an 
idol apparently speaking (in the Indian tongue) with great volubility. 
Suspecting the nature of the imposture, they broke the image, and dis- 
covered a concealed tube, which proceeded from it to a distant corner, 
where an Indian was hid under some leaves. It was this man, speaking 
through the tube, that made the idol utter, whatever he wished the hear- 
ers to believe. The Cacique prayed the Spaniards to keep the trick 
secret, as it was by it, that he secured tribute and kept his people in sub- 
jection. b 

a Common Places, Part ii, Chap. v. Lon. 15S3. 

b Histoire Generate. La Have. 1763. Tom. IS, p. 229. 



108 Illuminated Manuscripts. [Book I, 

Another device adopted by ecclesiastics, for subduing the turbulent 
passions of their ignorant people, and exciting in them feelings of respect 
for the church, was by making images of the Virgin and of Christ, to 
weep, and sometimes to sweat blood, &c. These effects being, of course, 
represented as the result of their impenitence. ' The fathers of Monte 
Vaccino made the wooden crucifix sweat that was fastened to the wall 
of their church ; through which they had a passage for the water to run 
into the body of the crucifix, wherein they had drilled several pores, so 
that it passed through in little drops.' De La Mortraye's Trav. Vol. i, 23. 
This was a staple trick of heathen priests ; hence Statius, in his Thehaid, 
B. ix, v. 906, represents the statue of Diana weeping. 

For tears descended from the sculptured stone. 

And Lucan, 

The face of grief each marble statue wears, 
And Parian gods and heroes stand in tears. 

In the temple of the great Syrian goddess at Hierapolis, were idols 
that could 'move, sweat and deliver oracles as if alive.'* Among an- 
cient chemical deceptions, the liquefaction of St. Januarius' blood, is still 
performed ; and once a year, all Naples is in suspense till the miracle is 
accomplished. We shall have occasion to notice other ingenious ancient 
devices for the same purposes of delusion, in the fourth Book, when speak- 
ing on the application of steam to raise water. 

Although the monks present lamentable examples of misdirected talents 
and misapplied time, their labors tended to the general progress of re- 
finement and learning. We may regret that unworthy spirits among them 
abused the superstitions of the times to their own advantage — imitating 
the statesmen and priests of antiquity, in making the oracles declare what 
they wished ; still, they were the only lights of the dark ages, and even 
their introduction of images of saints, &c. in place of the pagan idols, 
contributed in the end to the overthrow of idolatry, and was perhaps the 
only condition on which the barbarous people, could be induced to give 
up their ancient deities. ' It can hardlie be credited,' says Peter Martyr, 
1 with how greate labor and difficultie, man could be brought from the wor- 
shipping of images.' 

Another class devoted themselves to writing and copying, that is, to the 
art of multiplying books ; and their industry and skill have never been, 
and in all human probability, never will be surpassed. The beauty, uni- 
formity and effect of their pages, are equal to those of any printed volume. 
The richness of the illuminated letters, the fertility of imagination dis- 
played in their endlessly variegated forms, the brightness of the colors 
and gilding, and the minuteness of finish, can only be appreciated by 
those who have had opportunities of examining them. We have seen 
some in which the illustrations equalled the finest paintings in miniature. b 
In a literary and useful point of view, the labors of these men are above 
all praise. They were the channels through which many valuable works 
of the ancients have been preserved and transmitted to us. And as re- 
gards the arts, both ornamental and useful, the monks were at one time 
almost their only cultivators. 

a Univer. Hist, i, 373. b In the Library of John Allan, Esq. of this city. 



Chap 14.] Wheels for raising Water. 109 



CHAPTER XIV. 

Wheels for raising water— Machines described by Vitruvius— Tympanum— De La Faye's improve- 
ment—Scoop Wheel — Chinese Noria— Roman do. — Egyptian do. — Noria with Pots — Supposed origin of 
Toothed Wheels— Substitute for wheels and pinions— Persian Wheel: Common in Syria— Large ones 
at Hamath — Various modes of propelling the Noria by men and animals — Early employment of the lat- 
ter to raise water. Antiquity of the Noria— Supposed to be the 'Wheel of Fortune' — An appropriate 
emblem of abundance in Egypt — Sphinx — Lions' Heads — Vases — Cornucopia — Ancient emblems of 
irrigation — Medea: Inventress of Vapor Baths — Ctesibius — Metallic and glass mirrors — Barbers. 

Having examined such devices for raising water, as from their sim- 
plicity have been generally unnoticed in treatises on hydraulic machines, 
we proceed to others more complex ; and first, to such as revolve round 
the centres from which they are suspended, and which have a continuous 
instead of an alternating motion. Although differing in these respects and 
in their form, from the jantu or vibrating gutter and the swape, they will be 
found essentially the same; their change of figure being more apparent than 
real, and merely consequent on the new movement imparted to them. As 
these machines are obviously of later date than the preceding, it may per- 
haps be supposed, that the period of their introduction might be ascer- 
tained ; but so it is, that with scarcely an exception, the time when, place 
where, and the persons by whom, they were invented, are absolutely 
unknown. 

Although allusions to machines for raising water are found in several 
of their authors, it does not appear, that any general account or compre- 
hensive treatise of them, was ever written by the ancients. If such a 
work was executed, it has perished in the general wreck of ancient re- 
cords. About the beginning of the Christian era, a Roman architect and 
engineer, published a treatise on those professions, in which he inserted a 
brief description of some hydraulic engines. This is the only ancient work 
extant which treats professedly of them; and the whole that relates to them 
might be included in two pages of this volume. 

The machines described by Vitruvius, for it is to him we allude, are 
the Tympanum, Noria, Chain of Pots, the Screw, and the Machine of 
Ctesibius or Pump. He has not mentioned the jantu, swape, the cord and 
bucket, with the various modes of using the latter; probably, because he 
considered these too simple in their construction to be properly classed 
among hydraulic machinery; he therefore passed by them, and modern au- 
thors have generally followed his example. Notwithstanding the omission 
of these, there are circumstances which render it probable that his ac- 
count, brief as it is, includes all the principal machines that were used by 
the nations of the old world, if we except China. He wrote at a period the 
most favorable for acquiring and transmitting to posterity, a perfect know- 
ledge of the mechanic arts of the ancient civilized nations ; for he flourished 
during the last scenes of the mighty drama, when Rome had become the ar- 
bitress of the world, and the enlightened nations of the east — their wealth, 
learning, arts and artisans, were prostrate at her feet; so that if we were to 
suppose, absurd as it would be, that the previous intercourse of the Ro- 
mans with Asia Minor, Egypt, Carthage and Greece, had not made them fa- 
miliar with the arts of those countries, nothing could have prevented them 
from possessing such knowledge when they became Roman provinces — 



110 The Tympanum. [Book I. 

hence we infer, that if there had been in use in any of those countries, 
(for some centuries previous to or during" the life time of Vitruvius, and he 
was an old man when he published his work ;) any efficient machine for 
raising water, different from those he has described, it would have been 
known to the Romans, and would have been noticed by him. Moreover, 
he was evidently familiar with the inventions of the mechanicians of for- 
mer ages and frequently refers to them ; and as all the machines described 
by him, were of foreign origin, and most of them of such high antiquity 
as to reach back to ages anterior to the birth of Romulus and the founda- 
tion of Rome ; we have no reason to suppose that any important one has 
escaped him : to which we may add, if any useful machine for raising wa- 
ter had originated with his countrymen, he would scarcely have failed to 
record the fact. 

The tympanum consists of a series of gutters united at their open ends 
to a horizontal shaft, which is made hollow at one end and placed a little 
higher than where the water is to be elevated ; the gutters are arranged 
as radii, and are of sufficient length to extend from the shaft to a short 
distance below the surface of the water, as represented in the annexed di- 
agram. 

S, the shaft ; Gr, Gr, the gutters ; A, a trough 
to take away the water. The arrow indicates 
the direction in which the wheel turns ; each gut- 
ter, as it revolves scoops up a portion of water 
and elevates it, till by the inclination to the axle, 
it flows towards the latter, and is discharged 
through one end of it. 

Were the machine made as thus represented, i. e. 
of separate gutters and not connected to each other 
it could not be durable, as the weight of water 
raised at the end of each would have a tendency 
No. 44. Tympanum. to break them at their junction with the shaft. 

The ancients therefore made two strong disks 
of plank well jointed together, of the diameter of the intended wheel, these 
they secured on a shaft, at a distance from each other, proportionate to 
the quantity of water required to be raised. Any number of plank par- 
titions (Vitruvius says eight) were then inserted in the direction of radii 
between these disks, and were well secured to them, and made tight by 
caulking and pitch. The spaces between them, at the circumference of 
the wheel, were also closed, with the exception of an opening left for the 
admission of water to each ; and where each partition joined the shaft, a 
hollow channel was formed in the latter, parallel to the axis, through which 
the water was discharged into a trough or gutter placed immediately un- 
der it. The tympanum is obviously a modification of the jantu of India, 
or rather it is a number of them combined, and having a revolving instead 
of a vibratory movement. It is the first machine described by Vitruvius ; 
of which he observes, " it does not raise the water high, but it discharges 
a great quantity in a short time." B. x, Cap. 9. From its resemblance 
to a drum or tabor, it was named by the Romans Tympanum. 

The prominent defect of the tympanum arises from the water being 
always at the extremity of a radius of the wheel, by which its resistance 
increases as it ascends to a level with the axis ; being raised at the end of 
levers which virtually lengthen till the water is discharged from them. 
There is no reason to suppose, that this defect if perceived at all, by an- 
cient mechanicians, was ever remedied by them ; to most persons, the idea 
would never occur, that so simple a machine could be essentially improv 




Chap. 14.] 



The Tympanum and Scoop Wlieel. 



Ill 



ed, and its having been described as represented in the last figure by a 
Roman philosopher and engineer ; it was most likely used as thus con- 
structed, through the remote ages of antiquity, to the early part of the last 
century, when a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences, of France, 
M. De La Faye, developed by geometrical reasoning, a beautiful and 
truly philosophical improvement. It is described by Belidor, (Tom.ii, 385, 




No, 45. Tympanum improved by La Faye. 

o87,j together with the process of reasoning that led to it " When the 
circumference of a circle is developed j a curve is described, (the invo- 
lute) of which all the radii are so many tangents to the circle ; and are 
likewise all respectively perpendicular to the several points of the curve de- 
scribed, which has for its greatest radius, a line equal to the periphery of 
the circle evolved. Hence, having an axle whose circumference a little 
exceeds the height which the water is proposed to be elevated, let the 
circumference of the axle be evolved, and make a curved canal, whose 
curvature shall coincide throughout exactly with that of the involute just 
formed ; if the further extremity of this canal be made to enter the water 
that is to be elevated, and the other extremity abut upon the shaft which 
is turned ; then in the course of rotation, the water will rise in a vertical 
direction, tangential to the shaft, and perpendicular to the canal, in what- 
ever position it may be." See No. 45. 

The above figure from Belidor, is composed 
of four tubes only, but it is frequently con- 
tracted with double the number. Instead of 
tubes, curved partitions between the closed sides 
of the wheel are oftener used, as in the scoop 
wheel — which consists of a number of semi- 
circular partitions, extending from the axle to 
the circumference of a large flat cylinder. As 
it revolves in the direction of the arrows, the ex- 
tremities of the partitions dip into the water, 
and scoop it up, and as they ascend, discharge 
it into a trough placed under one end of the 
shaft, which is hollowed into as many compart- 
ments as there are partitions or scoops. Wheels of this description, and 
propelled by steam, are extensively used to drain the fens of Lincolnshire. 




No. 46. Scoop Wheel. 



112 



The Chinese Noria. 



[Book I. 



THE NORIA OR EGYPTIAN WHEEL. 

The tympanum has been described as an assemblage of gutters, and 
the Noria may be considered as a number of revolving swapes. It con- 
sists of a series of poles united like the arms of a wheel to a horizontal 
shaft. To the extremity of each, a vessel is attached, which fills as it dips 
into the water, and is discharged into a reservoir or gutter at the upper 
part of the circle which it describes. See No. 47. Hence, the former 
raises water only through half a diameter, while this elevates it through 
a whole one. The idea of thus connecting a number of poles with their 
buckets, must have early occurred to the agricultural machinists of Asia. 
The advantages of such an arrangement being equally obvious as in the 
tympanum. The means that naturally suggested themselves, of strength- 
ening a number of poles thus arranged, gradually brought these machines 
into the form of wheels. Sometimes, a rude ring was formed, to which 
the exterior ends were secured ; at others, disks of plank were adopted, 
and the vessels were attached either to the sides or rim, and sometimes to 
both. 




No. 48. Chinese Noria. 



No. 47. Noria. 



The Chinese make the noria, in what would seem to have been its pri- 
mitive form ; and with an admirable degree of economy, simplicity, and 
skill. With the exception of the axle and two posts to support it, the 
whole is of bamboo, and not a nail used in its construction. Even the 
vessels, are often joints of the same, being generally about four feet long 
and two or three inches in diameter. They are attached to the poles by 
ligatures at such an angle, as to fill nearly when in the water, and to dis- 
charge their contents when at, or near the top. See No. 48. 

The periphery of the wheel is composed of three rings of unequal di- 
ameter, and so arranged, as to form a frustrum of a cone. The smallest 
one, to which the open ends of the tubes are attached, being next the bank 
over which the water is conveyed. By this arrangement, their contents 
are necessarily discharged into the gutter as they pass the end of it. 
When employed to raise water from running streams, they are propelled 
by the current in the usual way — the paddles being formed of woven 
bamboo. The sizes of these wheels, vary from twenty to seventy feet in 



Chap. 14.] 



Egyptian Noria. 



113 



diameter. According to Staunton, some raise over three hundred tons of 
water in twenty-four hours. A writer in the Chinese Repository, men- 
tions others which raise a hundred and fifty tons to the height of forty 
feet, during the same time. They combine strength and lightness in a re- 
markable degree* 

The mode of constructing and moving the noria by the Romans, is 
thus described by Vitruvius : "When water is to be raised higher, than 
by the tympanum, a wheel is made round an axis, of such a magnitude, 
as the height to which the water is to be raised requires. Around the ex- 
tremity of the side of the wheel, square buckets cemented with pitch and 
wax are fixed ; so that when the wheel is turned by the walking of men, 
the filled buckets being raised to the top, and turning again toward the 
bottom, discharge of themselves what they have brought into the reser- 
voir." B. x, Cap. 9. Newton's Trans. As the drawings made by Vi- 
truvius himself, and annexed to his work are all lost, his translators do 
not always agree respecting the precise form of the machines described 
by him. Newton has figured the noria as a large drum, to one side of which 
square boxes or buckets are secured. These buckets are closed on all 
sides, with the exception of an opening to admit and discharge the water. 
Perault has placed them on the paddles or floats of an undershot wheel, 
like Barbaro, except that the latter makes the bottom of the boxes or 
buckets serve at the same time as paddles to receive the impulse of the 
stream. Rivius, in his German Translation, (Nuremburgh 1548,) has given 
one figure resembling an overshot wheel with the motion reversed, a form 
in which it is still sometimes made ; in another, it is similar to the noria 
of Egypt at the present day, a modification of it, probably of great antiquity. 




No. 49. Egyptian Noria. 



Instead of pots or other vessels secured to the arms by ligatures, or 
buckets attached to the sides of a wheel, as described by Vitruvius, the 
periphery of the wheel itself is made hollow, and is divided into a number 
of cells, or compartments, which answer the same purpose as separate ves- 



a Van Braam's Journal, 
Repository, iii, 125. 



172. Ellis's Journal of Amherst's Embassy, 280. Chinese 

15 



114 



Noria ivitli Pots. 



[Book ] 



sels. The figure No. 49, is taken from the Grande Description of Egypt. 
Plate 3, Tom. 2, E. M. It was sketched from one near Rosetta, which raised 
the water nine feet. The liquid enters through openings in the rim, and 
is discharged from those on the sides. The arrow shows the direction in 
which it moves. The section of part of the rim, will render the internal 
construction obvious. Mr. P. S. Girard, author of the Memoir on the 
Agriculture of the Egyptians, says they are extensively used in the Delta, 
the cog wheels being very rudely formed. 

The tympanum may be considered as a wheel with hollow spokes, 
while the noria, as above constructed, is one with hollow felloes, a term by 
which it is designated in French authors : ' Roue a jante creuses,' a name 
very expressive, and one which, in the absence of information respecting 
the construction of this machine, might enable a mechanic to make it. 

In various parts of Asia, Greece, Turkey, Spain, &c. Earthenware 
jars or pots, are secured to the rim or side of the wheel, as in No. 50. 
Every farm and garden in Catalonia, says Arthur Young, has such a ma- 
chine to raise water for the purpose of irrigating the soil. They are pro- 
pelled by horses, oxen, mules, and sometimes by men. In Spain, the 
noria has remained unaltered from remote times. It is there still moved 

by means of a device which 




a 

rise 



to toothed 



means 
probably gave 
wheels. 

In the axle of the noria are in- 
serted two, (and sometimes four) 
strong sticks which cross each oth- 
er at right angles, forming arms 
or spokes. The part of the shaft 
in which these are fixed, extends 
nearly to the centre of the path, 
round which the animal walks ; and 
contiguous to it, is the vertical 
shaft to which the yoke or beam 
is attached : the bottom of this shaft 
has spokes inserted into it similar 
to the former, and which take hold 
of them in succession, and thereby 
keep the wheel or noria in rota- 
tion. See No. 50. This rude con- 
trivance is common through all 
the east, and is in all probability 
identical with those of the early 
ages ; in other words, the primitive 
substitute of the modern cog 
wheel. 



No. 50. Noria with Pots. 

Theatre Des Instrumens' is an ingenious device by which 



In Besson's 
a horizontal shaft with four spokes, as in the last figure, can impart motion 
to a vertical one, at any distance from the centre, and thereby answer the 
purpose of a number of wheels and pinions in modifying the velocity of 
the machinery, according to the work it has to perform, or to an increase 
or diminution of the motive force employed. On the horizontal shaft, 
(which is turned by a crank,) is a sliding socket to which the spokes are 
secured. The vertical shaft has also a similar socket, which is raised and 
lowered by means of a screw, and to it, arms and spokes are well secur- 
ed. These are arranged in the form of a flat cone ; so that by adjusting 
the sockets, the spokes in the horizontal shaft can be made to take hold 



Chap. 14.] 



Persian Wheel. 



115 




on those which form the cone round the vertical one at any part, from its 
apex to its base. 

Two prominent defects have been pointed out in the noria. First, part 
of the water escapes after being raised nearly to the required elevation. 
Second, a large portion is raised higher than the reservoir placed to re- 
ceive it, into which it is discharged after the vessels begin to descend. 
(See No. 49, in which they are very conspicuous.) Consequently, part 
of the power expended in moving this wheel, produces no useful effect. 
These imperfections, however, did not escape the notice of ancient me- 
chanicians, for to obviate them, the Persian wheel was devised, and so 
named from its having been invented or extensively used in that country. 

The vessels in which the water is 
raised, instead of being fastened to the 
rim, or forming part of it, as in the 
preceding figures, are suspended from 
pins, on which they turn, and thereby 
retain a vertical position through their 
entire ascent ; and when at the top are 
inverted by their lower part coming in 
contact with a pin or roller attached to 
the edge of the gutter or reservoir, as 
represented in the figure. By this ar- 
rangement no water escapes in rising, 
nor is it elevated any higher than the 
edge of the reservoir; hence the defects 
in the noria are avoided. Persian wheels 
it is believed, have been used in Eu- 
rope ever since the Romans ruled 
over it, if not before. The greatest work in France according to Arthur 
Young, for the artificial irrigation of land, was a series of them in Lan- 
guedoc, which raised the water thirty feet. ' In a Dutch translation of 
Virgil's Greorgics in 1682, they are represented with huge buckets like 
barrels, suspended from both sides of the rim. They are common in 
Switzerland and the Tyrol. Travels in Poland by D'Ulanski, page 241. 
They were extensively used in England one hundred and fifty years ago. 
See Diet. Rusticum. Lon. 1704. We are not aware of their being much 
employed, if at all, in the United States. 

They are common in various parts of Asia. " The water wheels still 
used in Syria," says Mr. Barrow, "differ only from those of China, by 
having loose buckets suspended at the circumference, instead of fixed 
tubes." a Dr. Russel, in his 'Natural History of Aleppo,' (p. 20,) says the 
inhabitants make use of large quantities of water, " which they raise with 
the Persian wheel," from the river. Perhaps the most interesting speci- 
mens of these machines extant, are to be found in another and very ancient 
city of Syria; in Hamath on the Orontes, so named after its founder, one 
of the sons of Canaan. "Two days journey below Horns, (says Volney) 
is Hamath, celebrated in Syria for its water works. The wheels are 
the largest in the country, being thirty-two feet in diameter." The city is 
built on both sides of the river, and is supplied with water from it by 
means of them, the buckets of which empty themselves into stone aque- 
ducts, supported on lofty arches on a level with the ground on which the 
city stands. They are propelled by the current. Burckhardt observed about 
a dozen of them, the largest he says, "is called Naoura el Mahommeyde, 



No. 51. Persian Wheel. 



Embassy to China, Lon. 1806. p. 540. 



116 Modes of propelling the Noria. [Book 1 

and is at least seventy feet." a They are, he remarks, the greatest curiosity 
which a modern traveler can find in the city. Their enormous magnitude 
will be apparent, if we consider that the loftiest class of buildings in this 
city, (N. York,) those of six stories, seldom exceed sixty feet. If there- 
fore, the largest of the Persian wheels at Hamath, were placed on the 
pavement, with its side towards a range of such buildings, it would oc- 
cupy a space nearly equal to the fronts of three of them, and would ex- 
tend several feet over the roofs of the highest — and twelve of them would 
occupy a street, one sixth of a mile in length. 

The construction of the water works of Hamath have probably re- 
mained unaltered in their general design, from very remote times. The 
peculiar location of this city, the rapidity of the river, (named El Ausi, 
the swift,) and its consequent adaptation to propel undershot wheels, which 
we know, were used in such works by the ancients, render it probable 
that the present mode of raising water, is much the same as when this city 
flourished under Solomon ; and when the Romans under Aurelius, over- 
threw the queen of Palmyra and her army, in its immediate vicinity ; and 
from the great antiquity of the noria, its extensive use over all Asia in 
former ages, and its peculiar adaptation to Hamath, and the tenacious ad- 
herence of the orientals to the devices of their forefathers; we infer that 
the machines which Burckhardt beheld with admiration, raising the water 
of the Orontes, were similar to others in use at the same city, when the 
spies of Moses, searched the land, ' from the wilderness of Zin unto Rehob, 
as men come to Hamath' h These wheels may be cited as another proof of 
the preservation, (by continual use) of hydraulic machines, while every 
other memorial of the people by whom they were originally used, has 
long since disappeared. 

Modes of propelling the noria. — The tympanum, noria, chain of 
pots, and even the screw, were often turned, according to Vitruvius, by 
the ' treading' or ' walking of men,' i. e. except when employed to raise 
water from rapid streams, in "which case they were propelled, he says, by 
the current acting on float boards or paddles, as in common under-shot 
wheels. There is a difference of opinion among his translators respecting 
the mode by which men moved these machines. Rivius, the translator of 
the German edition of 1548, seems to have thought that they walked round 
an upright shaft, (as in figs. 26 and 53,)which they turned by horizontal 
bars, and by means of cog wheels communicated the required motion. 
He has also represented the noria as moved by men turning a crank ; a 
mode of propelling it that is figured in the first German edition of Ve- 
getius, (1511.) Barbaro, (1567,) represents the tympanum as moved by 
a crank ; the noria by a current of water ; and the chain of pots, by a 
tread wheel, like the one figured in No. 24. Perault, also, in his figure of 

a Travels in Syria, and the Holy Land. Lon. 1822, p. 146. 

b There are several interesting circumstances recorded respecting Hamath. This city 
and Damascus were frequently subject to the Jews. The ' land of Hamath,' was par- 
ticularly fatal to them and their kings. Zedekiah was there taken, and his sons and no- 
bles slain in his presence ; his own eyes were then put out, and he was carried a captive to 
Babylon, wheie he died. Jer. xxxix, 5. Pharaoh Necho there put Jehoahaz, another of 
their kings in bonds, whence he was taken a prisoner to Egypt, and confined till his 
death. 2 Kings xxiii, 34. Among the most interesting discoveries of modern times, 
connected with the ancient history of this people, are sculptured representations at 
Thebes, of the Jews captured by Shishak, with the hieroglyphical inscription, J Jo 
houda Melee,' king of the Jews. From the discoveries of Young and Champollion. 
the precision with which the dates are determined, is wonderful ; ' many of the sculp 
tures have the dates inscribed to the day and the month.' The figure of the Jewish 
king, is supposed to be a correct portrait, for we are told in those of the Egyptian mo. 
narchs, " the likenesses are always exactly preserved." 



Chap. 14.] Early employment of Animals to raise Water, 117 

the tympanum, places the men in a similar one, and this interpretation of 
the text has been generally followed. It is corroborated by other ancient 
authors, and by Vitruvius himself, in Book x, cap. 4, where he speaks of 
a wheel to raise weights, 'by the walking of men therein,' that is, the 
common walking crane. Philo, who was contemporary with Vitruvius, 
or flourished shortly after him, mentions a wheel for raising water, which 
was turned by the motion of men's feet, 'by their ascending successively 
the several steps that are within it.' Tread wheels are mentioned also 
by Suetonius, and Strabo speaks of some for raising the water of the Nile, 
which were moved by a hundred and fifty slaves. Mr. Newton, the En- 
glish translator, supposed the men walked on the outside of the wheel, 
like the modern tread mill. It is very probable that .this mode was in 
use among the ancients, for it is common in Persia and other oriental 
countries, particularly China, where it is undoubtedly of great antiquity. 
Barbaro has figured the screw, as propelled by men pulling down spokes 
on the periphery of a wheel attached to it, or by treading on them. 

About eighteen years ago, a person in this city, (N. York,) took out a 
patent for employing animals to propel such wheels. A horse was placed 
near the top and yoked to a horizontal beam fixed behind, and against 
which he drew. In January, 1795, a Mr. Eckhardt obtained a patent in 
England for 'A Method of applying Animals to Machinery in general.' 
His plan was to employ cattle and all other bulky animals to walk on the 
top of large wheels; he also proposed a flexible floor, like an endless chain, 
which passed over two wheels, and formed an inclined plane on which 
animals walked, and to increase the effect, they drew a loaded cart be- 
hind them. a Sixty years before this, viz. in 1734, Mr. W. Churchman 
exhibited before the Royal Society, a model of 'A new Engine for 
raising Water, in which Horses and other Animals draw without any loss 
of power.' This engine was a series of pumps worked by a large tread 
wheel, on the top of which horses were made to draw against a beam to 
which they were yoked. He also proposed to employ horses at the same 
time within the wheel. b But the contrivance was even then an old one, for 
in Agricola, a horse is figured imparting motion to bellows by walking 
upon a tread wheel. c 

There is a passage in the second chapter of the Koran, which throws 
some light on the early employment of animals in raising water. Among 
the ancients, it was a prevailing custom when they sacrificed an ox, or a 
heifer, to select such as had never been broken to labor : hence the direc- 
tion of the Sibyl to Eneas. 

Seven bullocks yet unyoked, for Phoebus choose, 
And for Diana, seven unspotted ewes. 

The Israelites also, were instructed to offer " a red heifer without spot 
wherein is no blemish, and upon which never came yoke" " An heifer 
which hath not been wrought with, and which hath not drawn in the yoke." 
One which, according to Mahomet, was " not broken to plough the earth, 
or water the field." Now this interpretation is not only consistent with 
the text of Moses, but is exceedingly probable, for the Arabs have un- 
doubtedly preserved with their independence and ancient habits, traditions 
of numerous transactions referred to in the Pentateuch, the particulars of 
which are not recorded ; besides it indicates, what indeed might have 
been inferred : viz. that the principal employment of animals in the early 
ages, was to plough and irrigate the soil. But when in process of time, 

a Repertory of Arts. Lon. 1795. Vol. ii. b Phil. Trans. Abridged bv Martvn. viii. 321. 
« De Re Metallica, 169 



118 Antiquity of the Noria. [Book I, 

human population became dense, then animal labor was in some degree 
superseded by that of man. The extensive employment of the latter, 
appears to have been a prominent feature in the political economy of an- 
cient Egypt, just as it is in modern China. As the country teemed with 
inhabitants, the extensive use of animal labor would not only have inter- 
fered with the means of the great mass of the former in obtaining a living, 
but would have required too large a portion of the land to raise food 
merely for the latter. 

The antiquity of the noria may be inferred from its name of " Egyptian 
wheel," the only one by which it was known in some countries. It is to 
be found if we mistake not, among the symbols of ancient mythology. 
In elucidating one of the religious precepts of Numa, which required 
persons when worshipping in the temples, to turn round ; Plutarch ob- 
serves, that this change of posture may have an enigmatical meaning, "like 
the Egyptian wheels, admonishing us of the instability of every thing 
human, and preparing us to acquiesce and rest satisfied with whatever 
turns and changes the divine being may allot." Life of Numa. This 
figurative application of the noria, is obviously used by Plutarch as a com- 
mon and consequently a long established symbol of the mutability of human 
affairs ; and, as the sentiment which he illustrates by it, is precisely the 
same as that which the ivheel of the goddess of fortune was designed to 
point out, the " instability of fortune," and of which it was the emblem, 
we conclude that the "wheel of fortune," was a water wheel, and no oth.- 
er than the noria ; and that to it, the Grecian philosopher in the above 
passage referred. The selection of an Egyptian wheel to denote the mu- 
tability of human affairs, indicates the origin not only of Plutarch's simili- 
tude, but also that of the fable of the goddess. Egypt was the source 
whence the Greeks obtained not only their arts and science, but also their 
mythology, with its deities, heroes and its mysterious system of symbolical 
imagery; and if the Egyptians were not the inventors of the system of 
representing and concealing things by symbols, they certainly carried it to 
a greater extent than any other people, and at a period long before the 
Greeks had emerged from barbarism, or an Egyptian colony had settled 
in their country. 

Although we are not aware that the wheel of fortune had any other 
signification, yet, as the same goddess presided over riches and abund- 
ance — a more expressive emblem of these in Egypt could not have been 
devised. Agriculture was the grand source of wealth in that country, 
and it depended almost entirely upon artificial irrigation, for except dur- 
ing the annual inundation of the Nile, water was raised for that purpose 
by machines, and among these, the noria was one of the most prominent, 
and probably one of the most ancient. Egypt without irrigation would 
have been a dreary waste, and like its neighboring deserts uninhabited by 
man; but by means of it, the soil became so exceedingly fertile that 
Egypt became "the garden of the east," — the " hot bed of nature," and 
the " granary of the world." It was artificial irrigation which, under the 
Pharaohs, produced food for seventeen millions of inhabitants, and in the 
reign of 'Rameses or Sesostris, a surplus sufficient for thirty-three millions 
more ; and even under the Grecian yoke, when its ancient glory had long 
departed, the prodigious quantities of grain, which it produced, enabled 
Ptolemy Philadelphus to amass treasure equal to nine hundred and fifty 
millions of dollars. There was therefore a peculiar propriety, whether 
designed or not, in the goddess of " prosperity," " riches," and " abund- 
ance," being accompanied with the noria or Egyptian wheel, the imple- 



Chap. 14.] 



Ancient emblems of Irrigation. 



119 



ment which contributed so greatly to produce them. The manner in 
which this deity was sometimes represented, appears to have had direct 
reference to agriculture and irrigation. She was seated on rocks, (em- 
blems of sterility X) the wheel by her side and a river at her feet, (to sig- 
nify irrigation X) and she held wheat ears, and flowers in her hand. But 
whether the ancient Egyptians adopted the noria or not, as the emblem 
of wealth and irrigation, one of their most favorite symbols has direct 
reference to the latter, and indirectly to the former : viz. the sphinx ; 
figures of which have been found among the ruins, from one end of the 
country to the other. This figure consists, as is universally known, of the 
the head and breasts of a woman, united to the body of a lion, and was 
symbolical of the annual overflow of the Nile, which occurred when 
the sun passed through the zodiacal signs, Leo and Virgo — hence the 
combination of these signs in the Sphinx, as an emblem of that general 
irrigation of the land once a year, upon which their prosperity so greatly 
depended. This was the origin of passing streams of water through the 
mouths of figures of lions, and sometimes, though more rarely, of virgins, as 
in the figures below — which are taken from Rivius' translation of Vitruvius. 




No. 52. Orifices of Pipes, &c. symbolical of Irrigation. 

The analogy between the form and ornaments of an object and its uses, 
seems to have always been kept in view by the ancients ; although, from 
our imperfect knowledge of them, it is difficult and sometimes impossible 
to perceive it. That they displayed unrivaled skill in some of their 'de- 
signs and decorations is universally admitted. There is certainly no na- 
tural analogy between a lion and a fountain, and no obvious propriety in 
making water to flow out of the mouths of figures of these animals ; on 
the contrary, they appear to be very inappropriate ; but when we learn 
that the lion as an astronomical symbol, was intimately associated with a 
great natural hydraulic operation, of the first importance to the welfare 
of the Egyptians, we perceive at once their reasons for transferring figures 
of it to artificial discharges of the liquid, and hence the orifices of cocks, 
pipes, and spouts of gutters, fountains, &c. were decorated as above. In 
some ancient fountains, figures of virgins, as nymphs of springs, leaned 
upon urns of running water. In others, vases overturned, (with figures 
of Aquarius, Oceanus, &c.) a beautiful device. Lions' heads for spouts 
are very common in Pompeii. 

There is another ancient emblem, and one that is universally admired, 
which may here be noticed, as its origin is associated with artificial irri- 
gation — the Cornucopia, or 'Horn of Abundance.' This elegant symbol 
is probably of Egyptian origin, for Isis was sometimes represented with 
it, and Isis, in the Egyptian language, signified the 'cause of abundance.' 
We have already seen that irrigation was and still is, the principal source 
of plenty in Egypt; and water in the scriptures is repeatedly used in the 
same sense. To understand the allegory, it must be borne in mind that 
rivers were anciently compared to bulls; the reasons for which at this re- 
mote period, are not very obvious ; perhaps among others, from the noise 



120 Medea : Ancient Vapor Baths. [Book I. 

of rapid streams, bearing - some resembance at a distance, to the lowing 
and bellowing of these animals ; and the branches of rivers were com- 
pared to their horns ; thus, the small branch of the Bosphorus, which 
forms the harbor of Constantinople, still retains its ancient name of the 
' Golden Horn ;' and in some of our dictionaries, 'winding streams' is 
given as one of the definitions of horns. The bull which is common on 
some Greek coins is supposed to have been the symbol of a river, per- 
haps from the overflow of some, when the sun passed through thekzodiacal 
sign Taurus. According to the Greek version, one of the branches of the 
river Achelous in Epirus, was diverted or broken off by Hercules, to irri- 
gate some parched land in its vicinity. This, like other labors of that 
hero, was allegorized by representing him engaged in conflict with a bull, 
(Achelous) whom he overcame, and broke off one of his horns; and this 
horn being filled with fruits and flowers, was emblematical of the subse- 
quent fertility of the soil. Ovid describes the contest, when that hero 

'twixt rage and scorn, 

From his maimed front, he tore the stubborn horn, 

This, heap'd with flowers and fruits, the Naiads bear, 

Sacred to plenty, and the bounteous year. 

****** 

But Achelous in his oozy bed 

Deep hides his brow deform'd, and rustic head, 

No real wound the victor's triumph show'd, 

But his lost honors griev'd the watery god. Met. ix. 

Thus river gods were sometimes represented with a cornucopia in one 
hand, and the other resting on a vase of flowing water. 

Another interesting allegory of the ancients has reference to water : 
the fable of Medea, who it was said, by boiling old people, made them 
young again, referred to warm or vapor baths, which she invented, and into 
which she . v ifused fragrant herbs — in other words, the 'patent medicated 
vapor baths' of the present day. She also possessed the art of changing 
the color of the hair. When therefore, by her fomentations, persons ap- 
peared more active and improved in health, and their grey hairs changed 
into ringlets of jet, the belief in her magic powers became irresistible — 
and when at length, her apparatus, i. e. the cauldrons, wood and Jire, Spc. 
were discovered, (which she had sedulously concealed,) it was supposed 
that her patients were in reality boiled. From Ovid, it seems she had the 
modern sulphur bath also, and used it in the cure of iEson, the father of her 
husband Jason : 

the sleeping sire, 

She lustrates thrice with sulphur, water, fire. 

* * * * * 

His feeble frame resumes a youthful air, 

A glossy brown, his hoary beard and hair. 

The meagre paleness from his aspect fled 

And in its room sprang up a florid red. Met. vii. 

This lady was the great patroness of herb and steam doctors of old ; and 
may be considered the ancient representative of modern manufacturers of 
specifics, which, as they allege, (and often truly) remove all diseases. The 
fable of her slaying her own children in the presence of Jason, is easily 
explained by her administering to them the wrong medicine, or too large 
a dose of the right one ; the latter was certainly the case with old Pelias 
who expired under it. 

Having noticed in this chapter the supposed origin of cog-wheels, we 
may as well introduce here an ancient mechanic, to whom we shall have 
occasion hereafter to allude ; one, whose name is intimately associated 
with the most valuable machines for raising water, and with several im- 



Chap. 14.] Ctesibius. 121 

portant improvements in the mechanic arts. As the earliest distinct notice 
of cog-wheels is in the description of one of his machines, (see the clep- 
sydra, pace 547,) we may as well introduce him to the reader at this 
part of our subject, although we have not yet in the progress of our 
work, arrived at the period at which he flourished. 

During the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus over Egypt, an Egyptian 
barber pursued his vocation in the city of Alexandria. Like all professors 
of that ancient mystery, he possessed besides the inferior apparatus, the 
two most essential implements of all : a razor and a looking glass, or 
mirror, probably a metallic one. This mirror, we are informed, was sus- 
pended from the ceiling of his shop, and balanced by a weight, which 
moved in a concealed case in one corner of the room. Thus, when a 
customer had undergone the usual purifying operations, he drew down 
the mirror, that he might witness the improvement which the artist had 
wrought on his outer man ; and, like Otho, 

In the Speculum survey his charms. Juv . Sat. ii. 
after which he returned it to its former position for the use of the next 
customer* It would seem that the case in which the weight moved was 
enclosed at the bottom, or pretty accurately made, for as the weight 
moved in it, and displaced the air, a certain sound was produced, either. 

a Metallic mirrors furnish one of the best proofs of skill in working the metals in the 
remotest times, for their antiquity extends beyond all records. In the first pages of his- 
tory they are mentioned as in common use. The brazen laver of the Tabernacle, 
was made of the mirrors of the Israelitish women, which they carried with them out of 
Egypt. From some found at Thebes, as well as representations of others in the sculp- 
tures and paintings, we see at once that these ' looking glasses,' (as they are called in 
Exodus.) were similar to those of Greek and Roman ladies : viz. round or oval plates 
of metal, from three to six inches in diameter, and having handles of wood, stone and 
metal highly ornamented and of various forms, according to the taste of-tne wearer. 
Some have been found in Egypt with the lustre partially preserved. They are com- 
posed of an alloy of copper, and antimony or tin, and lead ; and appear to have been 
carried about the person, secured to, or suspended from the girdle, as pincushions and 
scissors were formerly worn and are so still by some antiquated ladies. The Greeks 
and Romans had them also of silver and of steel. Some of the latter were found in 
Herculaneum. Plutarch mentions mirrors enclosed in very rich frames. Among the 
articles of the toilet found in Pompeii, are ear-rings, golden and common pins, and 
several metallic mirrors. One is round and eight inches in diameter, the other an ob 
long square. They had them with plane surfaces, and also convex and concave. Se 
neca says his countrywomen had them also, equal in length and breadth to a full grown 
person, superbly decorated with gold and silver, and precious stones. Their luxury in 
this article, seems to have been excessive, for the cost of one often exceeded a mo- 
derate fortune. The dowry which the Senate gave the daughter of Scipio, according 
to Seneca, would not purchase in his time, a mirror for the daughter of a freedman. 
The Anglo-Saxon dames had portable metallic mirrors, and wore them suspended from 
the waist. It is not a litle singular that the ancient Peruvians had them also, formed of 
silver, copper and its alloys, and also of obsidian stone. They had them plane, convex, 
and concave. Had not the art of making these mirrors been revived in the speculums 
of reflecting telescopes, their lustre could hardly have been appreciated ; and they 
would probably have been considered as indifferent substitutes for the modern looking- 
glass. These last are supposed to have been manufactured in ancient Tyre, and of a 
black colored glass. Fluid lead or tin was afterwards used. It was poured on tlr* 
plates while they were hot from the fire, and being suffered to cool, formed a back 
which reflected the image. Looking-glasses of this description were made in Venice, 
in the 13th century. It was not till about the 16th, that the present mode of coating the 
back with quicksilver and tin foil was introduced. The inventor is not known. 
Venus was sometimes represented with a speculum m one hand, and the astronomical 
Bymbol of the planet Venus is the figure of one. There is a chemical examination 
of an ancient speculum in the 17th volume of Tilloch's Phil. Mag. 

Barbers flourished in the mythologic ages, for Apollo having prolonged the ears of 
Midas to a length resembling those of a certain animal, the latter it is said, endeavored 
to hide his disgrace by his hair, but found it impossible to conceal it from his barber 
Bronze razors were anciently common. 

16 



122 The Chain of Pots. [Book 1 

by its expulsion through some small orifice, or by its escape between the 
sides of the case and the weight. This sound had probably remained 
unnoticed like the ordinary creaking of a door, perhaps for years, unti? 
one day as the barber's son was amusing himself in his father's shop, his 
attention was arrested by it. This boy's subsequent reflections induced 
him to investigate its cause ; and from this simple circumstance, he was 
led eventually either to invent, or greatly to improve the hydraulic organ, 
a musical instrument of great celebrity in ancient times. His ingenuity 
and industry were so conspicuous, that he was named ' The Delighter in 
Works of Art.' His studies in various branches of natural philosophy, 
were rewarded it is said, with the discovery of the pump, air-gun, fire-en- 
gine, &c. He also greatly improved the clepsydra or water-clock, in the 
construction of which he introduced toothed wheels, and even jeweled 
holes. Vitruvius, ix, 9. These ancient time-keepers, were therefore the 
origin of modern clocks and watches. Now this barber's son is the indi- 
vidual we wish to introduce to the reader, as Ctesibius of Alexandria, 
one of the most eminent mathematicians and mechanicians of antiquity — 
one, whose claims upon our esteem, are not surpassed by those of any 
other individual, ancient or modern. 

It will be perceived that the simple, the trivial sound produced by the 
descent of the weight in his father's shop, was to him, what the fall of the 
apple was to Newton, and the vibration of the lamp or chandelier in the 
church at Pisa, to Galileo. The circumstance presents another to the nu- 
merous proofs which might be adduced, that inquiries into the causes of 
the most trifling or insignificant of physical effects, are sure to lead, di- 
rectly or indirectly, to important results — while to young men especially, 
it holds out the greatest encouragement to occupy their leisure in useful 
researches. It shows, that however unpropitious their circumstances may 
be, they may by industrious application, become distinguished in science, 
and may add their names to those of Ctesibius and Franklin, and many 
others — immortal examples of the moral grandeur of irrepressible per- 
severance in the midst of difficulties. 



CHAP T E R XV. 

THE CHAIN OF POTS— Its origin— Used in Joseph's well at Cairo— Numerous in Egypt— Attempt ot 
Bclzoni to supersede it and the noria — Chain of pots of the Romans, Hindoos, Japanese, and Europeans — 
Described by Agricola — Spanish one — Modern one — Applications of it to other purposes than raisiug 
water — Employed as a first mover and substitute for overshot wheels — Francini's machine — Antiquity o/ 
the chain of pots — Often confounded with the noria by ancient and modern authors — Introduced into 
Greece by Danaus — Opinions of modern writers on its antiquity — Referred to by Solomon — Babylonian 
engine that raised the water of the Euphrates to supply the hanging gardens — Rope pump — Hydraulic 
Belt 

The tympanum and noria in all their modifications, have been consider- 
ed as originating in the gutter or jantu, and the swape ; while the ma- 
chine we are now to examine is evidently derived from the primitive cord 
and bucket. The first improvement of the latter was the introduction of 
a pulley (No. 11) over which the cord was directed — the next was the ad- 
dition of another vessel, so as to have one at each end of the rope, (Nos. 
13 and 14) and the last and most important consisted in uniting the ends 



Chap. 15.] Egyptian Chain of Pots. 123 

of the rope, and securing to it a number of vessels at equal distances 
through the whole of its length — and the chain of pots, was the result. 

The general construction of this machine will appear from an examin- 
ation of those which are employed to raise water from Joseph's well 
at Cairo, represented at page 46. Above the mouth of each shaft a 
vertical wheel is placed ; over which two endless ropes pass and are sus- 
pended from it. These are kept parallel to, and at a short distance from 
each other, by rungs secured to them at regular intervals, so that when 
thus united, they form an endless ladder of ropes. The rungs are some- 
times of wood, but more frequently of cord like the shrouds of a ship, 
and the whole is of such a length that the lowest part hangs two or three 
feet below the surface of the water that is to be raised. Between the 
rungs, earthenware vases (of the form figured No. 7) are secured by cords 
round the neck, and also round a knob formed on the bottom for that pur- 
pose. See A, A, in the figure. As the axis of the two wheels are at 
right angles to each other, two separate views of the chains are repre- 
sented. In the lower pit, both ropes of one half of the chain is seen ; 
while in the upper, the whole length of one is in view. The vases or 
pots are so arranged that in passing over the wheel, they fall in between 
the spokes which connect the two sides of the latter together, as shown in 
the section ; and when they reach the top, their contents are discharged 
into a trough. [In some machines the trough passes under one rim which 
is made to project for that purpose; in others, it is placed below the wheel 
and between the chains.] There are in the upper pit, one hundred and 
thirty-eight pots and the distance from each other is about two feet seven 
inches. The contents of each are twenty cubic inches. The wheels that 
carry the chains are six feet and a half in diameter. They are put in mo- 
tion by cog wheels (on the opposite end of- their axles) working into oth- 
ers that are attached to the perpendicular shafts to which the blindfolded 
animals are yoked. 

The chain of pots in Egypt is named the Sakia. Its superiority over 
the noria and tympanum, &c. in being adapted to raise water from every 
depth, has caused it to be more extensively employed for artificial irriga- 
tion than any other Egyptian machine — hence it is to be seen in operation, 
all along the borders of the Nile, from its mouth up to the first cataract. 
In Upper Egypt, and Nubia, they are so exceedingly numerous as to oc- 
cur every hundred yards ; and in some cases they are not forty yards apart. 
Their numbers and utility have rendered them a source of revenue, for we 
are informed that each sakia is taxed twenty dollars per annum, while the 
swape is assessed at half that amount. They are also common in Abys- 
sinia. They were noticed there by Poncet in 169S. When Sandys was 
in Egypt, A. D. 1611, the great number of sakias did not escape his 
observation : " Upon the banks all along are infinite numbers of deepe 
and spacious vaults into which they doe let the river, drawing up the wa- 
ter into higher cesterns, with wheeles set round with pitchers, and turned 
about by buffaloes." Travels, page 118. 

An attempt was made some years ago by an enterprising European to 
supersede the employment of these machines in Egypt, which on account 
of the interesting circumstances connected with it may here be noticed. 
In the latter part of the last century an intelligent young man of Padua 
was designed by his parents for a monk, and was sent to Rome to receive 
an appropriate education. His inclination however led him to prefer the 
study of natural philosophy to that of theology, and particularly hydrau- 
lics. Upon the invasion of Italy and capture of Rome by the French, he 
wandered over various parts of Europe, supporting himself by publicly per 



124 



Roman Chain of Pots. 



[Book I, 



forming feats of agility and strength, and by scientific exhibitions. After 
roving thus for fifteen years, he determined to visit Egypt, under the belief 
that he would make his fortune there by introducing machinery on the prin- 
ciple of the pump, as substitutes for the noria and chain of pots, &c. In 
June 1815, he landed at Alexandria, and after some delay was introdu- 
ced to Mahommed Ali, (the present Pasha,) who approved of his project, 
and in whose gardens at Soubra, three miles from Cairo, he constructed 
his machine. But no sooner was it completed and put in operation than 
he discovered in the Turkish and Arabic cultivators an unconquerable op- 
position to its introduction. Indeed this result might have been anticipa- 
ted, and, if we are not mistaken, they were right in preferring their own 
simple apparatus to an elaborate machine, of the principle of whose action 
they were utterly ignorant. Their rejection of it was looked upon as an- 
other example of superstitious adherence to the imperfect mechanism of 
former ages ; but under all the circumstances, it was, we believe, an evi- 
dence of the correctness of their judgment. Thus disappointed, his 
brightest hopes blasted, and his pecuniary resources all but exhausted — 
for he received no renumeration, either for the loss of his time or his 
money — he, with an energy of character deserving all praise, determined 
to make the best of his misfortunes. He therefore turned his attention 
to that subject which necessarily occurs to every intelligent stranger in 
Egypt — its antiquities — and while the British Museum remains, and the 
colossal head of young Memnon is preserved, the name of Belzoni will 
be remembered and respected. 

From the following description of the chain of pots by Vitruvius, it ap- 
pears that the Romans made it of more 
durable materials than either the an- 
cient or modern people of Asia. " But 
if a place of still greater height (than 
could be reached by the noria) is to be 
supplied ; on the same axis of a wheel, 
a double chain of iron is wound and let 
down to the level of the bottom ; hav- 
ing brass buckets, each containing a 
congius (seven pints) hanging thereto, 
so that upon the turning of the wheel, 
the chain revolving round the axis 
raises the buckets to the top ; which 
when drawn upon the axis, become in- 
verted and pour into the reservoir the 
water they have brought." Book x, 
Cap. 9, Newton's Trans. As no re- 
ference is made to the form of the ves- 
sels, by Vitruvius, we find them repre- 
sented by translators in a variety of 
shapes, as cylinders, cubes, truncated 
cones, pyramids, as well as portions of, 
and combinations of them all. Some 
are left open at the top, and both with 
and without projecting lips in front, by 
which to shoot the contents over the 
edge of the reservoir as they pass the 
No. 53. Roman chain of Pots. wheel or drum. Others are closed, 

and admit and discharge the water through an orifice or short tube as re- 
presented. (No. 53.) From the separate figure of one of the vessels it 




Chap. 15.] Hindoo CJiain of Pots. 125 

will be seen that the tubes are placed at the upper corner, and consequent- 
ly retain the water till the vessels ascend the drum, when it is discharged 
as represented. Provision should be made for the escape of air from 
these vessels, as they enter the water, and also for its admission on the 
discharge of the liquid above. The wheel or drum which carries the 
chain is, in this figure, solid, and cut into a hexagonal form to prevent it 
from slipping. 

There is also in old authors a great diversity in the construction of the 
chains, and also in their number. Some understand by the term * double 
chain,' merely a simple one doubled and its ends united ; i. e. one whose 
length is equal to double the space through which the water is to be ele- 
vated by it. Others suppose two separate ones intended and placed par- 
allel to each other, the vessels beinsr connected to them as in the fisrure. 
Others again, and among them Barbaro, figure two sets of chains and pots 
carried by the same wheel. He has also made them pass under pulleys 
in the water, a useless device, except when the chains are employed in an 
inclined position. 

The chain of pots is mentioned by most oriental travelers, although de- 
scribed by few. In Terry's voyage to India in 1615, speaking of the 
tanks and wells of the Hindoos, he observes, " they usually cover those 
wells with a building over head, and with oxen draw water out of therr , 
which riseth up in many small buckets, whereof some are always going 
down, others continually coming up and emptying themselves in troughs 
or little rills, made to receive and convey the water, whither they please." 
p. 187. To the same machine Fryer refers, when speaking of the differ- 
ent modes of raising water from deep wells. It is drawn up, he says, by 
oxen " with huge leathern buckets or pots around a wheel." p. 410. 
And again at Surat, it is drawn up " in leathern bags upon wheels." p. 
104. Had not wells been mentioned in connection with these extracts 
from Fryer, we might have supposed it was the noria to which he alluded. 
Tavernier mentions it in the same way as applied to draw water from 
wells *in Persia, p. 143. When required to raise it from rivers, they 
were, as in the case of the Persian wheels on the Orontes, propelled by 
the current when it was sufficiently rapid for the purpose. " As for the 
Euphrates, (observes Tavernier,) certain it is that the great number of 
mills built upon it, to convey water to the neighboring grounds, have not 
only rendered it unnavigable, but made it very dangerous." Lucan in 
the 3d book of his Pharsalia alludes to this extensive diversion of the wa- 
ter for agricultural purposes, in his time. 

But soon Euphrates' parting waves divide, 
Covering, like fruitful Nile, the country wide. 

These mills are probably similar to those referred to by Montanus in 
his account of Japan, p. 296. The city of Jonda, he observes was de- 
fended by a strong castle, which was " continually supplied with fresh 
water by two mills." It is a pity they were not described. 

The chain of pots was used by all the celebrated nations of antiquity 
and it still is employed more or less over all Asia and Europe. Previous 
to the 16th century, it constituted the ' water works' for supplying Europe- 
an cities, and was often driven by windmills — as it still is in Holland. It 
seems to be the ne plus ultra of hydraulic engines among half civilized 
nations, while those only which are enlightened,, have the pump. Even 
the materials of which it was made by different people of old, may be 
considered as emblematical of their national characters. The inhabitants 
°f Egypt, central and southern Asia, employed light and fragile materials; 



126 



Spanish Chain of Pots. 



[Book 1. 



the ropes were fibres of the palm tree, and the vessels of earthenware ; 
while the Romans made the chains of iron and the vessels of brass. The 
former people were soft, effeminate, and easily subdued; the latter stern 
and inflexible — an iron race. 

It is described by Agricola as employed in the German mines. De Re 
Metallica, pp. 131, 132, 133. The chains and vessels are represented 
of various forms, and the latter both of iron and wood, and propelled by 
tread and water wheels.* In Besson's '■ Theatre,' A. D. 1579, it is figured 
as worked by a pendulum and cog wheels — the teeth being continued 
over half the peripheries only. b 

In Spain it has remained in continual use since the conquest and occu- 
pation of that country by the Romans ; and was perhaps previously intro- 
duced by the Phenicians, a people, to whom Spain was early indebted 
for many valuable acquisitions. It was employed there by the Moors in the 
middle ages, under whom the inhabitants enjoyed a degree of prosperity 
and civilization unexampled during any subsequent period of their histo- 
ry. The arts and manufactures were carried to great perfection, so much 
so, that in the twelfth century, while the rest of Europe was in compara- 
tive barbarism, the tissues of Grenada and Andalusia were highly prized 
at Constantinople, and throughout the eastern empire. To the Moors of 
Spain, Europe was greatly indebted for the introduction and dissemination 
of many of the arts of the east ; among others they introduced the Asiatic 
system of agriculture, with its inseparable adjunct artificial irrigation. We 
are told they divided the lands into small fields, which were kept constantly 
Mnder tillage ; and "they conveyed water to the highest and driest spots " 




No. 54. Spanish Chain of Pots. 

The chain of pots in Spain, is in the form and material of its vessels 



a The De Re ' Metallica' of George Agricola is invaluable for its account of the hy- 
draulic engines employed in the mines of Germany in the 16th and preceding centu 
ries ; being doubtless similar to those used by the Romans in some of the same mines, 
and continued uninterruptedly in use. The first edition of this work was published in 
1546, others in 1556— 1558— 1561— 1621— and 1657, all at Basil. Brunei's ' Manuel 
Du Libraire et De L'Amateur de Livres.' Paris, 1820. It is a copy of the last edition 
we make use of. The author was born in 1494, and died in 1555. 

b See also Kircher's Mundus Subterraneus. Tom. ii. pp. 195, 228. 



Chap. 15.J 



Modern Chain of Pots. 



127 



and the imperfect substitutes for cog wheels, identical with those of Egypt 
and Asia, and may be considered a fair representative of this machine as 
used in the agricultural districts of the ancient world. 

No. 55, represents a section of a mod- 
ern machine. The wheel is placed in or 
over a cistern designed to receive the wa- 
ter. Buckets are secured to the chain be- 
tween the joints of the latter, and the 
wheel as it revolves, receives the cen- 
tre of these joints on the ends of its 
arms, which are suitably shaped for the 
purpose. The buckets therefore fall in 
between the arms of the wheel and be- 
come inverted in passing over it as in 
the figure. 




No. 55. Modern Chain of Pots. 



The chain of pots has been applied 
to a great variety of purposes. It has 
been employed for ages, in cleansing 
docks, deepening harbors, &c. The 
vessels being made of iron and formed 
like wide scoops, are made to pass un- 
der pulleys attached to the bottom of a 
moveable frame, which is raised and 
lowered, to suit the varying depth of 
the channel. Besson also proposed it 
to raise mortar, &c. to the top of city 
walls, fortifications, &c. and wherever 
large quantities were required ; an ap- 
plication of it that is worthy of the notice of extensive builders, for the 
time consumed and exertion expended by a laborer, in ascending a long lad- 
der or flight of stairs to deposit a modern hodful of mortar, and returning 
through the same space, is hardly consistent with the spirit of economy 
and useful research that characterizes the age. The amount of force con- 
sumed in bearing his own body twice over the space, independently of the 
load, would in a well regulated device of this kind produce an equal re- 
sult. Oliver Evans introduced the chain of pots into his mills, for the pur- 
pose of transmitting flour and grain to the different floors. 

It has been adopted as a substitute for water wheels. As the noria, 
when its motion is reversed by the admission of water into its buckets at 
^the upper part of the periphery, is converted into an overshot wheel — so 
the chain of pots, has in a similar manner, been made to transmit power 
and communicate motion to other machines. In locations where there is 
a small supply of water, but which falls from a considerable height, it be- 
comes a valuable substitute for the overshot wheel, as a first mover. It 
is remarkable that this obvious application of it should not have occurred 
to European mechanicians previous to the 17th century. It was designed 
by M. Francini, and by the direction of Colbert, the illustrious and pa- 
triotic minister of Louis XIV, one was erected in 1668, in one of the pub- 
lic gardens at Paris. A natural spring in this garden supplied water for 
the plants. It was received into a large basin, and to prevent its over- 
flowing, the surplus or waste water was discharged by a gutter into a well, 
at the bottom of which it disappeared in the soil. M. Francini took ad- 
vantage of this fall of waste water in the well, and made it the means of 
raising a portion of the spr ng water sufficiently high to form a jet d'eau. 



128 



FrancinVs Machine. 



[Book L 



He erected a chain of pots, E, B, No. 56, which reached from the bot- 
tom of the well to such a height above its mouth as the water to form 
the jet was required to be raised. From the upper wheel or drum, another 

chain of pots, D, C, was suspended 
and carried round by it, the lower end 
dipping into the water to be raised 
from the spring A. By this arrange- 
ment the weight of the water in de- 
scending the well in the buckets of 
the first chain, raised a smaller portion 
(allowing for friction) through the 
same space by the second one — and a 
proportionable quantity still higher. 
A spout conveyed the water into the 
buckets of the driving or motive chain 
as shown at B. These buckets were 
made of brass, and wide at the top, 
the better to receive water from the 
spring ; and also that when one was 
filled, the surplus might fall down its 
sides into the next one below, and 
from that to the third one, and so on, 
that none might be lost by spilling 
over. The buckets of the other chain 
were of the same form and material, 
but instead of being open like the for- 
mer, they were closed on all sides, 
the water being received into them at 
A, and discharged from them at m, 
through short necks or tubes, e, s, 
which are upwards when the buckets 
ascend, being connected to the smaller 
part of the latter. A pipe from the 
upper cistern 772-, conveyed the water to form the jet. The arrow indi- 
cates the direction in which both chains move. The vessels on the chain 
E, B, below B, descending into the well, (the bottom of which is not shown,) 
full — while those shown at D, C, are empty. 

The chain of Pots has been employed to work pumps in mines, to pro- 
pel thrashing machines, &c. &c. a 

There is much confusion in the notices of the chain of pots by ancient 
authors, from their referring to it without discrimination as a ' wheel? and 
thus confounding it with the tympanum and noria, and that modification 
of the latter, known as the Persian wheel. From the circumstance of 
its having been propelled in the same manner as these, viz : by oxen in 
the usual way, (through the medium of cog wheels,) or by men walking 
upon or within a wheel, &.-,. it has from custom, inadvertence, or from a 
superficial knowledge of its distinctive features, been classed with them. 
It was of it that Strabo spoke, " which by wheels and pulleys raised the 
water of the Nile to the top of a very high hill ; and which, instead of 
being moved by oxen, was propelled by one hundred and fifty slaves." 
And when Julius Csesar was beseiged in Alexandria by the Egyptians, 




No. 56. Francini's Machine. 



a See Vol. i, of machines approved by the French Academy. Desaguliers' Philos 
Vol. ii Edinburgh Encyc. Vol. x, 896. 



Chap. 15.] Chain of Pots. 129 

the chain of pots was included among the " wheels and other engines," 
by which the latter raised water from the sea and discharged it into the 
cisterns that supplied Cassar's army with fresh water. It was most like- 
ly among the " hydraulic engines," which Herodotus observes the Baby- 
lonians had, to raise water from the Euphrates to irrigate their lands. 
These ' engines' were certainly similar to those of India, Egypt, Greece, 
and other neighboring countries ; for if they had been of novel construc- 
tion, or peculiar to Chaldea, he would scarcely have failed to notice so 
important a fact, if he even omitted (as he has) to describe them. 

The same lack of discrimination is obvious in almost all the accounts 
of modern as of ancient authors, respecting this machine. When they 
speak of wheels for raising water, it is as difficult to ascertain those to 
which they allude, as it is in the parallel passages of Philo and Diodorus, 
Strabo and Caesar. Thus Tavernier in his passage down the Tigris to 
Bagdat, remarks, " all the day long, we saw nothing upon either side of 
the river, but pitiful huts, made of the branches of palm trees, where live 
certain poor people that turn the wheels, by means whereof they water 
the neighboring ground." Sometimes the chain of pots is mentioned by 
travelers as the Persian wheel, and popular extracts from their works 
tend greatly to perplex enquirers into its history. When we met with 
statements from Shaw's travels, that the Persian wheel was extensively 
used on the banks of the Nile, through all Egypt, they were so much at 
variance with the testimony of other oriental travelers, and so foreign to 
our impressions respecting the use of that machine in Egypt, that we had 
immediate reference to his work ; when the apparent discrepancy was 
explained. He describes and figures the chain of pots (sakia) as the 
Persian wheel* Norden commits the same error : " they likewise employ 
the Persian wheel with ropes of pitchers, which is turned by oxen." b 
Twiss also describes the Spanish chain of pots as the Persian wheel, and 
which he observes is used " all over Portugal, Spain, and the Levant." 6 

Other travelers speak of it as the Noria. Mr. Jacob, in his " Tra- 
vels in the South of Spain," Lon. 1811, page 152, says the Spaniards "use 
a mill of Arabic origin, from which our chain pump is evidently derived ; 
it is called a noria. A vertical wheel over a well has a series of earthen 
jars fastened together by cords of Esparto, which descend into the water 
and fill themselves by the motion of the wheel. The vertical wheel 
is put in motion by a horizontal one, which is turned by a cow. No 
machine can be more simple." In the Grande Description of Egypt, 
it is designated ' Roue a pots, ,d instead of naming it from the chain, 
its peculiar and distinguishing feature. It certainly has nothing in com- 
mon with the noria, except the pots or vessels in which the water is raised; 
and these in the latter, are suspended from the arms of inflexible levers, 
and ascend in the arc of a circle ; while in both these circumstances, and 
others might be named, there is no resemblance whatever between them. 
The chain of pots is generally named by French authors, ' Chapelet,' from 
its resemblance to the string of beads, which Roman catholics, Mahome- 
tans, Budhists, &c. (like the Pagans of old) use in repeating their prayers. 
This appellation is sufficiently discriminating, and is appropriate ; certainly 
more so than Roue a pots, since it serves to separate this machine from 
every species of wheels, and to preserve a distinction between two very 
different classes of hydraulic engines. 

The chain of pots seems always to have been used to raise water from 

a Travels, page 337. b Travels in Egypt and Nubia, Vol. i, 56. 

■ Travels through Portugal and Spam in 1772, and 73. Lon. 1780, page 329. 

d Tom. 2. Memoirs, E. M. Plate 5. 

17 



130 Pumps of Danaus. [Book I. 

Joseph's well. If the location of this well, its peculiar construction, di- 
vision into two distinct shafts, the chamber between them for the animals 
which propel the machinery, the passage for their ascent and descent, and 
its enormous depth, be maturely considered, it will appear, we think, that 
no other machine could at any time have been used, or intended by its con- 
structors to have been used in raising its water ; if therefore this celebra- 
ted well be, as supposed, a work of the ancient Egyptians, or a relic of 
Babylon, then the endless chain of pots may safely be regarded as coeval 
with the foundation of that ancient city, if not, as it probably is, much 
more ancient. 

It was probably the ' pump,' which according to tradition, Danaus 
introduced into Greece, a thousand years before the building of Babylon 
by the Persians. During the time the Israelites were in Egypt, this 
prince, in consequence of domestic quarrels, left it with his family and 
friends, and sailed for Greece. They landed on the coast of Peloponessus 
or the Morea, and were hospitably entertained at Argos, where they set- 
tled. It is said, the Greeks did not at that time possess the knowledge of 
obtaining water from wells ; the companions of Danaus having been the 
first to dig them, and to introduce pumps. Pliny vii. 56. If the inhabit- 
ants of Greece were ignorant of wells, previous to the arrival of these 
strangers, they could certainly have had no occasion for pumps ; and it 
was natural for the Egyptians, when they dug wells, to introduce their 
own country methods of obtaining water from them. 

As the word ' pumps,' is not however to be understood in the restricted 
sense in which it is at present used, the question occurs, what kind of ma- 
chines were these] 1. They must have been simple in their construction, 
for otherwise they would have been ill adapted to a rude and uncultivated 
people, and such the Greeks were while ignorant of wells. 2. They 
must have been of general application to the wells of Greece. 3. They 
were such as, from their great utility, were continued in use through sub- 
sequent ages, for they were highly prized, and the memory of their intro- 
duction preserved. 4. They were such as were previously used in Egypt. 
Now, of all ancient devices for raising water, to which the term ' pwnp' 
could with any propriety be applied, the#chain of pots is the only one that 
fulfils the conditions premised. It is evident that the jantu and its modi- 
fications are wholly inapplicable to raise water from wells ; and the tym- 
panum and noria are equally so. The swape is not adapted to deep wells 
and those of Greece were generally such : yet as it is admirably adapted 
to raise water from small depths, and was so used by the ancient Greeks ; 
it is probable that it was also introduced by Danaus ; as we know that it 
was in common use in Egypt, in his time. (See figures 36 and 43.) It 
must however have been of extremely limited application to wells on ac- 
count of their depth. (See page 38.) The modern inhabitants of Egypt 
raise water with it only about seven feet ; and from the figures just referred 
to, it is obvious that in the time of Danaus, it was raised no higher by it. 
but if its application was even extended in Greece, to elevate water from 
twice that depth, its employment in wells must have been comparatively 
trifling. 

It could not have been the chain pump, for it does not appear, that 
either the Greeks or Romans were acquainted with that machine. Vi- 
truvius is silent respecting it. Nor can we suppose any thing like the 
atmospheric or forcing pump intended — even, if it could be proved that 
both were then known. They are too complex to have been at all suited 
to the Greeks at that remote age. Indeed they are altogether worthless 
to a rude people, who would be unable to keep them in order, or to detect 



Chap. 15.] Antiquity of the Chain of Tots. 131 

the causes of their ceasing to act. But that the 'pumps' of Danaus were 
some kind of bucket machines, like the chain of pots, is inferable from 
the account of his daughters' punishment. They were condemned to draw 
water from deep wells, and would of course, use the machines their fa 
ther introduced. Now we are told that the vessels in which they raised 
the. liquid leaked so much, that the water escaped from them ere it reach- 
ed the surface — hence their endless punishment. The witty remark of 
Bion implies the same thing. A person speaking of the severe punish- 
ment of these young women, in perpetually drawing water in vessels full 
of holes, he remarked, " I should consider them much more to be pitied 
were they condemned to draw water in vessels without holes." Hence, 
we infer that the Egyptian sakia or chain of pots, was the ' pump' in- 
troduced by Danaus, and that to it tradition refers. It was the only one 
to which, from its construction, and adaptation to every depth, the name 
of ' pump' could have been applied — while from its simplicity and effi- 
ciency, it was a gift of no ordinary value to the Greeks ; and the introduc- 
tion of it into their country was worthy of being preserved from oblivion. 

It is believed to have been in uninterrupted use there since the age of 
Danaus ; although history may not have preserved any record or repre- 
sentation of so early an employment of it. It is still used on the conti- 
nent and in the islands, as well as throughout Syria and Asia Minor. At 
Smyrna it is as common as a pump with us. In " Voyage Pittoresque de 
la Grece," Paris, 1782, Plate 49, contains a drawing, and page 9 a 
description of one in a garden at Scio, the ancient Chios, and capital city 
of the island of the same name. It is similar to the one represented in 
No. 54, and is doubtless identical with those employed in the same cities, 
when Homer was born near the former, and when he kept a school in 
the latter. 

On the antiquity of this and preceding machines, we add the opinions of 
recent writers. " A traveler standing on the edge of either the Libyan or 
Arabian desert, and overlooking Egypt, would behold before him one of 
the most magnificent prospects ever presented to human eyes. He would 
survey a deep valley, bright with vegetation, and teeming with a depres- 
sed but laborious population engaged in the various labors of agriculture. 
He would see opposite to him another eternal rampart, which, with the 
one he stands upon, shuts in this valley, and between them a mighty river, 
flowing in a winding course from the foot of one chain to the other, fur- 
nishing lateral canals, whence the water is elevated by wheels and buck- 
ets of the rudest structures, worked sometimes by men and sometimes by 
cattle, and no doubt identical with the process in use in the days of Sesos- 
tris." H " These methods" (of raising water to irrigate the land,) "are not 
the invention of the modern Egyptians, but have been used from time im- 
memorial without receiving the smallest improvement."'** "Even the creak- 
ing sound of the water wheels, as the blindfolded oxen went round and 
round, and of the tiny cascades splashing from the string of earthen pots 
into the trough which received and distributed the water to the wooden 
canals ; were not disagreeable to my ears, since they called up before the 
imagination, the primitive ages of mankind, the rude contrivances of the 
early kings of Egypt, for the advancement of agriculture, which have un- 
dergone little change or improvement up to the present hour. ," c 

Like every other machine that has yet been named, the date of its ori- 

a North American Review, Jan. 1839. p. 185-6. b History of the Operations of the 
French and British Armies in Egypt. Newcastle 1809. Vol. i, page 92. 
c St. John, " Egypt and Mohammed Air." Vol. i, 10. 



132 Chain of Pots referred to in Ecclesiastes. [Book L 

gin is unknown. From its simplicity, its obvious derivation from the prim- 
itive cord and bucket, its employment over all Asia and Egypt at the 
present time, and its extensive use in the ancient world ; there can be no 
question of its great antiquity. Vitruvius is alike silent respecting the 
origin of this, as of the noria and tympanum, and doubtless for the same 
reason — their origin extended too far into the abyss of past ages to be dis- 
covered. It is singular that the ancients, who attributed almost every 
agricultural and domestic implement to one or other of their deities, should 
not have derived the equally important machines for raising water from a 
similar source. The origin of the plough they gave to Osiris, of the harrow 
to Occator, the rake to Sarritor, the scythe to Saturn, the sickle to Ceres, 
the flail to Triptolemus, &c; and as they attributed the art of manuring 
ground to a god, they surely ought to have given the invention of ma- 
chines to irrigate it to another. 

To the chain of pots, there is an allusion in the beautiful description of 
the decay and death of the human body, in the 12th chapter of Ecclesi- 
astes : " Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken; 
or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cis- 
tern." In the east, the chain is almost uniformly made of cord or rope ; 
and the former part of the passage appears to refer to the ends, which 
are spliced or tied together, becoming loosened, when the vessels would 
necessarily be broken, for the whole would fall to the bottom ; an occur- 
rence which is not uncommon. The term silver cord, is expressive of its 
whiteness, the result of its constant exposure to water and the bleaching 
effect of the sun's rays : and golden bowl refers to the red earthenware 
pots or vases, in which the water is raised. Both pots and cords stream- 
ing with water, and glittering in the sun, presented to the vivid imagina- 
tions of the orientals, striking resemblances to burnished gold and silver. 
The circulation of the stream of life in man, (his blood ) a its interruption 
in disease and old age, his energies failing, and the mechanism of his 
frame wearing out, and at last ceasing forever to move; are forcibly illus- 
trated by the endless or circulating cord of this machine; its raising living 
waters and dispersing them through various channels, as so many streams 
of life, until its vessels, the pitchers, become broken, and the flow of the 
stream interrupted, and the wheel, upon which its movements depended, 
becoming deranged, broken, and destroyed. 

That the pots or vases are frequently broken, we learn from numerous 
travelers. In the account of Joseph's well, in the Grande Description, it 
is said to be necessary for a man to be in constant attendance, to keep the 
animals which move it from stopping, and to replace the pitchers that are 
broken. And that the wheels were often deranged is more than pro- 
bable, when we consider how exceedingly rude and imperfect is their 
construction over all the east. The surprise of travelers has often been 
elicited by their continuing to work at all, while exhibiting every symptom 
of derangement and decay. " The water wheels, pots, ropes, &c." says 
Mr. St. John, " had an extremely antique and dilapidated appearance ; and, 
if much used, would undoubtedly fall to pieces. " b We are told that a 
more striking picture of rude and imperfect mechanism could scarcely be 
conceived ; and it is not improbable, that the ■ Egyptian Wheel' as an em- 
blem of instability, had reference to its defective construction and con- 

a That the circulation of the blood was known to the ancients, see Du tens' 'Inquiry 
into the origin of the discoveries attributed to the Moderns ' Lon. 17C9, pp. 210, 222 
b Egypt and Mohammed Ali, i, 326, 127. 



Ciiap. 15.] The Babylonian Engine. 133 

stant liability to derangement, as much so as to its rotary movement. Nor 
is it likely that they were much superior at any time in Judea, for the 
Jews never cultivated the arts to any extent. The mechanics among 
them when they left Egypt were probably more numerous and expert 
than during any subsequent period of their history. In the eleventh cen- 
tury B. C. when Saul began to reign, there was not a blacksmith in the 
land, or one that could forge iron ; they had been carried off by the Phi- 
listines ; and although David at his death left numerous artificers, when his 
son built the temple and his own palace, he obtained mechanics from Tyre. 
It is moreover possible that the plaints and moanings incident to old 
age, * when the grasshopper shall be a burden and desire shall fail,' were 
also intended to be pointed out by the perpetual creaking of these rickety 
machines, as indicative of approaching dissolution. The harsh noise they 
make has been noticed by several travelers. St. John speaks of the creak- 
ing sound of the water wheels ; and Stephens, in his ' Incidents of Travel/ 
observes, " it was moonlight, and the creaking of the water wheels on 
the banks, (of the Nile) sounded like the moaning spirit of an ancient 
Egyptian.'' 



ON THE ENGINE THAT RAISED WATER FROM THE EUPHRATES TO SUPPLY THE 
HANGING GARDENS AT BABYLON. 

There is a machine noticed by ancient authors, which probably belongs 
to this part of our subject, and it is by far the most interesting hydraulic 
engine mentioned in history. Some circumstances connected with it, are 
also worthy of notice. It was constructed and used in the most ancient 
and most splendid city of the postdiluvian world ; a city which according 
to tradition existed like Joppa, before the deluge : viz. Babylon — a city 
generally allowed to have been founded by the builders of Babel; subse- 
quently enlarged by Nimrod; extended and beautified by Semiramis; 
and which reached its acme of unrivaled splendor under Nebuchadnezzar. 

The engine which raised the water of the Euphrates to the top of the 
walls of this city, to supply the pensile or hanging gardens, greatly ex- 
ceeded in the perpendicular height to which the water was elevated by it, 
the most famous hydraulic machinery of modern ages ; and like most of 
the works of the remote ancients, it appears to have borne the impress of 
those mighty intellects, who never suffered any physical impediment to 
interfere with the accomplishment of their designs ; and many of whose 
works almost induce us to believe that men ' were giants in those days.' 
The walls of Babylon, according to Herodotus, i, 178, were 350 feet high! 
Diodorus Siculus and others make them much less; but the descriptions 
of them by the latter, it is alleged, were applicable only, after the Per- 
sians under Darius Hystaspes retook the city upon its revolt, and demo- 
lished, or rather reduced their height to about 50 cubits ; whereas the fa- 
ther of history gives their original elevation, and incredible as it may ap- 
pear, his statement is believed to be correct. He is the oldest author 
who has described them ; and he visited Babylon within one hundred and 
twenty years of Nebuchadnezzar's death; and four hundred before Dio- 
dorus flourished. He has recorded the impressions which at that time, 
the city made on his mind, in the following words, " its internal beauty 
and magnificence exceed whatever has come within my knowledge;" and 
Herodotus, it must be remembered, was well acquainted with the splen- 
did cities of Egypt and the east. Had not the pyramids of Geezer, the 
temples and tombs of Thebes and Karnac, the artificial lakes and canals 
of Egypt, the wall of China, the caves of Ellora and Elephanta, &c. 



134 The Babylonian Engine. [Book I. 

come down to our times; descriptions of them by ancient authors, would 
have been deemed extravagant or fabulous, and their dimensions reduced 
to assimilate them with the works of modern times: so strongly are 
we inclined to depreciate the labors of the ancients, whenever they 
greatly excel our own. According to Berosus, who is quoted by Jose- 
phus, Antiq. x, 11, it was Nebuchadnezzar who constructed these gardens, 
so that the prophet Daniel must have witnessed their erection, and also 
that ol the hydraulic engine ; for he was a young man when taken a cap- 
tive to Babylon in the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar's reign, and he con- 
tinued there till the death of that monarch and of his successor. Amytis, 
the wife of Nebuchadnezzar, was a Mede, and as Babylon was situated 
on an extensive plain, she very sensibly felt the loss of the hills and 
woods of her native land. To supply this loss in some degree, these fa 
mous gardens, in which large forest trees were cultivated, were con- 
structed. They extended in terraces formed one above another to the 
top of the city walls, and to supply them with the necessary moisture, 
the engine in question was erected.* 

As no account of the nature of this machine has been preserved, we 
are left to conjecture the principle upon which it was constructed, from 
the only datum afforded, viz : the height to which it raised the water. 
We can easily conceive how water could have been supplied to the upper- 
most of these gardens by a series of machines, as now practised in the east 
to carry water over the highest elevations — but this is always mentioned 
as a single engine, not a series of them. Had its location been determin- 
ed, that circumstance alone, would have aided materially in the investi 
gation ; but we do not certainly know whether it was placed on the highest 
terrace — on a level with the Euphrates — or at some intermediate elevation. 
The authors of the Universal History remark, "upon the uppermost of these 
terraces was a reservoir, supplied by a certain engine, from whence the 
gardens on the other terraces were supplied." They do not say where the 
engine itself was located. Rollin places it on the highest part of the gar- 
dens : " In the upper terrace there was an engine or kind of pump by 
which the water was drawn up." 

The statement of an engine having been erected at the top is probably 
correct, for we are not aware that the ancients at that period possessed 
any machine which, like the forcing pump, projected water above itself. 
Ancient machines, (and every one which we have yet examined, is an ex- 
ample,) did not raise water higher than their own level. But if sucking 
and forcing pumps were then known and used in Babylon, a period howev- 
er, anterior to that of their alleged invention, of at least 500 years, still if 
this engine was placed on the uppermost terrace, both would have been 
wholly inapplicable. If therefore we incline to the opinion that this en- 
gine was a modification of one of those ancient machines, which we have 
already examined ; we are not led to this conclusion by supposing the 
state of the arts in Babylon at the period of its construction, to have 
been too crude and imperfect to admit of more complex or philosophical 

a Paintings found in Pompeii, represent Villas of two stories having trees planted on 
their roofs. These kind of gardens were probably not very uncommon in ancient 
times in the east, though none perhaps ever equaled those of Babylon. They have 
been continued to modern times in Asia. Tavernier, when in Bagnagar (the modern 
Hyderabad) the capital of (iolconda, found the roofs of the large courts of the palace 
terraced and containing gardens, in which were trees of such immense size " that it is 
a thing of great wonder how those arches should bear so vast a burden." The origin 
of these and of the city was similar to that of the Babylonian gardens. The King at 
the importunity of Nagar, one of his wives, founded the city and named it after her 
Bagnagar — i. e, " the gardens of JNagar." 



Chap. 15.] The Babylonian Engine. 135 

apparatus — on the contrary, we know that the Babylonians carried many 
of the arts to the highest degree of refinement. " They were great con- 
trivers," in this respect, and " fell short of no one nation under the sun, 
so far from it, that they in a great measure showed the way to every na- 
tion besides." Univer. His. Vol. i, 933. Besides, it is. certainly more 
philosophical to suppose this famous engine to have been a modification 
of some machine, which we have reason to believe was used in Chaldea at 
that time, and capable of producing the results ascribed to the Babylonian 
engine, than of any other of which that people possibly knew nothing. 

Of all ancient machines, the chain of pots was certainly the best adapt- 
ed for the purpose, and if we mistake not, the only one that could, with 
any regard to permanency and effect, have been adopted. It stands, and 
justly so, at the head of all ancient engines for raising water through great 
elevations ; and it may be doubted whether any machine could now be 
produced better adapted for the hanging gardens of Babylon — either in the 
economy and simplicity of its construction ; durability and effect ; or be 
less liable to derangement, less expensive, or less difficult for ordinary 
people to repair. The project of raising water through a perpendicular 
elevation, exceeding three hundred feet, in numerous vessels attached to 
an endless chain, would probably startle most of our mechanicians ; and 
some might suppose that the weight of so long a chain, if made of iron, 
would overcome the tenacity of the metal ; but almost all the works of 
the remote ancients partook of the same bold features. ^Magnitude in some 
of their machines, is as surprising as in other departments of their labors. 
Their engineers seem to have carried it to an extent that in modern days, 
would be considered as verging on the limits of the natural properties of 
materials. 

That the chain of pots was the standard machine for raising water in 
quantities from great depths would appear from Vitruvius, since it is the 
only one adapted for that purpose which he has described, except the 
"machine of Ctesibius ;" and as he professes to give an account of the 
" various machines for raising water," and his profession as a civil engi- 
neer would necessarily render him familiar with the best of them, it is 
clear that he was ignorant of any other having been in previous use. 
That the engine at Babylon was no other than the chain of pots, may be 
inferred from the employment of the latter in Joseph's well, where it 
raises water to an elevation nearly equal to that ascribed to the former ; 
and if the subject were of sufficient interest, we think a connection might 
be traced between them, if Joseph's well be, as supposed, a relic of Egypt- 
ian Babylon. Both Egypt and Chaldea were subject to the same monarch 
at the time that city was built. Twenty two or three years only had elapsed 
after Nebuchadnezzar's death when Cyrus took Babylon, and with it the 
empire ; and nine years after he was succeeded by his son Cambyses, who 
when in Egypt, it is alleged, founded a city on the site of modern Cairo, 
and named it after old Babylon. Cambyses reigned seven years and five 
months. If, therefore, the Babylonian machine was superior to the ' chain 
of pots,' (and it must have been, if it differed at all from the latter, for 
otherwise it would not have been selected,) then it would, we think, as a 
matter of course, have been adopted also in Joseph's well, in which the 
water was required to be elevated to about the same height as in the 
hanging gardens. Besides, if it possessed peculiar advantages, it would 
certainly have been preserved in use, as well as the chain of pots, for the 
wealth, comfort, and even existence of the people of the east, have at all 
times depended too much upon such machines to suffer any valuable one 
to be lost. 



136 



Rope Pump. 



[Book 1. 



But was the chain of this machine formed of metal, or of ropes? Of 
the latter we have no doubt. They are generally made of flax or fibres of the 
palm tree at the present day over all the east. In great elevations, chains 
of rope possess important advantages over those of metal, in their supe- 
rior lightness, being free from corrosion, and the facility of repairing them. 
But by far the most interesting problem connected with the Babylonian 
engine is, was the water of the Euphrates raised by it to the highest ter- 
race at a single lift % If we had not been informed of one reservoir only, 
on the upper terrace " from whence the gardens on the others were water- 
ed," we should have supposed the water really raised as in Joseph's well, 
i. e. by two, or even more separate chains ; and as it is, we cannot believe 
that so ingenious a people as the Babylonians would raise the whole of 
the water which the gardens required to the uppermost terrace, when the 
greatest portion of it was not wanted half so high. As the size of the ter- 
races diminished as they approached the top of the walls, it is probable that 
full two thirds of the water was consumed within one hundred feet of the 
ground. We therefore conclude that this famous engine was composed 
of at least two, and probably more, separate chains of pots; and even then, 
it might with as much propriety, be noticed by ancient authors as a single 
machine, as that at Cairo still is, by all modern travelers. Winkelman 
says, the famous gardens at Babylon had canals, some of " which were 
supplied by pumps and other engines." And Kircher in his Turris Babel, 
1679, represents fountains and jets oVeau on every terrace. 




No. 57. Rope Pump. 

There is another device that belongs to this chapter. Every person 
knows, that where water is dispersed over extended surfaces, and of too lim- 
ited depth to allow the use of a vessel to scoop it up, various substances 
are employed to absorb it, as sponge and woolen rags, and from which it is 
separated by pressure. A housemaid, when washing a floor, thus collects 
in a cloth the liquid dispersed in the purifying process ; and by wring- 
ing returns it to the vessel. The process is substantially the same as that 
adopted to raise water in Vera's Rope Pump. See No. 57. 

This machine consists of one or more endless ropes, formed of loosely 



Chap. 16.] Hydraulic Belt. 137 

spun wool or horse hair, and stretched on two pulleys like the endless 
chain of pots. These pulleys have grooves formed on their surfaces for 
the reception of the ropes. One of them is placed over the mouth of a 
well, and the other suspended in or secured to the bottom. A rapid mo- 
tion is communicated to the upper pulley, by a multiplying wheel, and 
the ascending side of each rope then carries up the water absorbed by it ; 
and which is separated from it when passing over the upper pulley, partly 
by centrifugal force, and partly by being squeezed in the deep groove, or 
by passing through a tube as shown in the figure. In the beginning of 
the motion, the column of water adhering to the rope, is always less than 
when it has been worked for some time, and continues to increase till the 
surrounding air partakes of its motion. By the utmost efforts of a man, 
nine gallons of water were raised by one of these machines from a well, 
ninety-five feet deep, in one minute. Adam's Philos, Vol. iii, 494. 

The hydraulic belt is a similar contrivance. It is an endless double 
band of woolen cloth, passing over two rollers, as in figure 57. It is driven 
with a velocity of not less than a thousand feet per minute ; when the water 
contained between the two surfaces is carried up and discharged as it passes 
over the upper roller, by the pressure of the band. Some machines of 
this kind are stated to have produced an effect equal to seventy-five per 
cent, of the power expended, while that of ordinary pumps seldom ex- 
ceeds sixty per cent. See Lon. Median. Mag. Vol. xxix, page 431. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

The Screw — An original device — Various modes of constructing it — Roman Screw — Often re-invented 
— Introduced into England from Germany — Combination of several to raise water to great elevations — 
Marquis of Worcester's proposition relating to it, exemplified by M, Pattu — Ascent of water m it 
formerly considered inexplicable — Its history — Not invented by Archimedes — Supposed to have been in 
early use in Egypt — Vitruvius silent respecting its author— Conon its inventor or re-inventor — This phi- 
losopher famous for his flattery of Ptolemy and Berenice — Dinocrates the architect — Suspension of metal 
lie substances without support — The screw not attributed to Archimedes till after his death — Inventions 
often given to others than their authors — Screws used as ship pumps by the Greeks — Flatterers like 
Conon too often found among men of science — Dedications of European writers often blasphemous — 
Hereditary titles and distinctions — Their acceptance unworthy of philosophers — Evil influence of scien- 
tific men in accepting them — Their denunciation a proof of the wisdom and virtue of the framers of the 
U. S. Constitution — Their extinction in Europe desirable — Plato, Solon, and Socrates — George HJ — 
George IV — James Watt — Arago — Description of the ■ Syracusan,' a ship built by Archimedes, in 
which the Screw Pump was used. 

The Cochleon or Egyptian Screw, the machine next described by 
Vitruvius, is, in every respect, the most original one of which he has giv- 
en an account. Unlike the preceding, which appear to have been in a 
great measure deduced from each other, it forms a species of itself; and 
whoever was its inventor, he has left in it a proof of his genius, and a 
lasting monument of his skill. If it be not the earliest hydraulic engine 
that was composed of tubes, or in the construction of which they were in- 
troduced, it certainly is the oldest one known of that description; and in 
its mode of operation it differs essentially from all other ancient tube ma 
chines ; in the latter the tubes merely serve as conduits for the ascending 
water, and as such are at rest; while in the screw it is the tubes themselves 
in motion that raises the liquid. 

18 



138 



The Screw. 



[Book 1 



This machine has been constructed in a variety of ways. Sometimes 
by winding 1 , in the manner of a screw, one or more flexible tubes 

(generally of lead or strong leath- 
er) round a cylinder of wood or 
iron. This cylinder is sustained 
by gudgeons in such a position, 
that at whatever angle with the 
horizon it is used, the plane of 
the helix must always be inclined 
to its axis at a greater angle ; oth- 
erwise no water could be raised 
by it any more than by turning 
it in the wrong direction. The 
lower end being immersed in wa- 
ter, the liquid enters the tube and 
is gradually raised by each revo- 
lution until it is discharged above. 
These machines are commonly 
used at an inclination to the hori- 
zon of about 45°, although they 
sometimes are placed at 60°. See 
the figure. 

No. 58. Screw. Instead of tubes wound round 

a cylinder, large grooves were sometimes formed in the latter and cover- 
ed by boards or sheets of metal, closely nailed to the surfaces between 
the grooves — so that the latter might be considered as tubes sunk into 
the cylinder, instead of being folded round its exterior. 





No. 59. Roman Screw. 

Another mode was to make the threads of plank, arranged as a helix 
ound a solid cylinder, which was fitted with journals, and made to 
revolve in ajixed hollow cylinder of the same length ; the edges or ex- 
tremities of the threads rubbing against the sides of the latter, and con- 
sequently producing the same effect as No. 58. This modification of the 
cochleon is known as the German Snail. It has this advantage, that it 
may be worked in an open channel, or half a cylinder instead of a whole 
one, since it is only the lower half of the latter, that is essential to the 
the operation of raising water. Machines of this kind of large dimen- 
sions have long been employed by the Dutch, and are generally driven 



Chap. 16.] The Screw. 139 

by windmills. But the outer cylinder is more generally fixed to the 
edges of the helix, and turned with it. It was made in this manner by 
the ancient Romans ; the outer cylinder or case was of plank, well joint- 
ed together, and nailed to the edges of the screw, and the whole , cemented 
with pitch, and bound together by iron hoops. It was moved like the 
noria, &c. " by the walking of men." Vitruvius, B. x, Chap. 11. See 
No. 59. 

The screw as represented in the preceding figures, has never been lost 
to the world since its invention, although it has long been unknown in that 
country in which it was devised — Egypt. It appears early in printed 
books. In the first German edition of Vegetius, (1511) it is figured, and 
nearly in a vertical position. A laborer with a feather in his cap, and a 
sword at his side, is seated across the top of the frame, and turns it by a 
crank. a 

Like almost every other hydraulic engine, the screw has often been 
re-invented. Cardan mentions a blacksmith of Milan, who imagining him- 
self its original inventor, "for joy, ran out of his wits," and the writer 
recollects when a boy, hearing of an ingenious shoemaker in much the 
same predicament. It appears to have been, like other machines for the 
same purpose, introduced into England from Germany. " The Holland- 
ers, (says Switzer,) have long ago, as some books that I have seen of 
theirs of fortification intimate, us'd them in draining their morassy and 
fenny ground, from whence they have heen brought into England; and used 
in the fens of Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire and other low countries. 
Those of the smallest kind that are worked by men have only an iron 
handle, as a grindstone has; but the largest that are wrought by horses, 
have a wheel like the cog-wheel of a horse mill. This engine, (he con- 
tinues,) which takes hold of the water, as a cork screw does a cork, will 
throw up water as fast as an overshot wheel, whereby in a short time, an 
infinite number of water may be thrown up; and I remember when the 
foundation of the stately bridge of Blenheim was laid, we had some of 
them used with great success ; and they are also used in the New River 
Works, about Newbury, Berkshire, and said to be the contrivance of a 
common soldier, who brought the invention out of Flanders." Hydros- 
tatics, 296, 298. 

When employed to raise water to great elevations, a series of two, 
three, or more, one above another, have been employed; the lower one 
discharging its contents into a basin, in which the inferior end of the next 
above is immersed, the whole being connected by cog wheels. Thus an 
old author observes, " you may raise water to any height in a narrow place, 
viz. within a tower to the top thereof, as we have known done at Au- 
gusta, in Germany ; to wit, if the spiral pipes be multiplied, so that the 
water being raised by the lower spiral, and being poured out into some re- 
ceptacle or cistern ; hence, it may be raised higher again by another spiral, 
and so successively by more spirals, as high as you please, all which spir- 
als may be moved by one power, viz. by the water of a river underneath, 
or by another animated power." Moxon. 

It was one of the objects of the Marquis of Worcester, and his ' unpa- 
ralleled workman, Caspar KaltofF,' to avoid the necessity of thus combin- 

a Whether sitting was the usual position of European laborers and mechanics when 
at work, in the middle ages, we know not ; but Cambden has a remark which intimates 
that all English mechanics had not in his time, abandoned this oriental custom In con- 
cluding his long account of " the States and Degrees of England," from kings, princes, 
dukes, lords, knights, &c. he continues, " lastly, craftsmen, artizans or workmen ; be they 
that labor for hire, and namely, such as sit at work, mechanicke artificers, smiths, car 
penters," 8?c. 



140 



M. Pattu's Improvements. 



[Book 1 



ing a number of them together, as appears from the fifty-third proposition 
in the ' century of inventions,' " A way how to make hollow and cover 
a water screw, as " big and as long as one pleaseth, in an easy and cheap 
way." How, and of what materials he made this, is not known, but the 
fifty-fifth proposition, in the following words, has been fully and practical- 
ly developed by a French engineer. " A double water screw, the inner- 
most to mount the water, and the outermost for it to descend, more in 
number of threads, and consequently in quantity of water, though much 
shorter than the innermost screw by which the water ascendeth ; a most 
extraordinary help for the turning the screw to make the water rise." In 
1815, M. Pattu published an account of the following improvements, by 
which the ideas of Worcester are realized. 




No. 



No. 61. 



No. 62. 



No. 60. represents two separate screws formed on the same axis, one 
of which, A, is long and narrow and serves for the nucleus of C, which 
is much wider and shorter. This is designed to propel the former. The 
threads of both wind round the axis in opposite directions, so that when those 
on one appear to be moving upwards, those on the other seem to be going 
downwards. The water from the stream M, is directed into the top of 
the large screw, and by its weight (as on an overshot wheel) puts the 
whole in motion, and consequently the water at O, in which the lower end 
of A revolves, is raised into the cistern at B. No. 61 is merely the same 
machine inverted. It illustrates the applications to such locations as have 
a short fall above the place to which the water is to be raised. In No. 62 
the small screw drives the large one, through which the water from the 
lowest level is raised sufficiently high to be discharged at an intermediate 
one, as at G. From these figures it will be perceived that the screw has 
been employed like the noria and the chain of pots, to transmit power. 

This machine was formerly considered as exhibiting a very singular 
paradox, viz. that the water " ascended by descending," and the mystery 
was, how both these operations could be performed at the same time, and 
yet produce so strange a result. It was remarked that when those form- 
ed of glass, were put in motion, the water ran down the under side of each 
turn of the tubes, and continued thus to descend until it was discharged 
at the top ! The whole operation and the effects being visible, there 
seemed no room for dispute, however contrary to acknowledged princi- 
ples the whole might appear. The case was apparently inexplicable, and 
seemed to present a parallel one to that of the asymtote ; the properties 
of the latter being as incapable of demonstration to the senses, as the sup- 
posed operation of this machine could be reconciled to the mind. Indeed 
the proposition, that two geometrical lines may continue to approach each 
other forever, without the possibility of coming in contact, is apparently, 
quite as impossible, as that water should ascend an inclined plane, by the 
mere exercise of its own gravity. But the idea of water descending in 



Chap. 16.] 



The Screw. 



143 




No. 63. 



its passage through the screw was altogether an illusion. On the contra 
ry, it is uniformly raised by the continual elevation of that part of the tub* 
which is immediately behind the liquid, and which pushes it up in a man- 
ner analagous to that represented by the following diagram. 

Suppose AY,, the edge 
of a wide strip of cloth 
or tape, secured at both 
ends, at an angle with 
the horizon, as repre- 
sented, and upon which 
the boy's marble or 
ball at P, can roll. If 
we hold the pen with 
which we are writing 
under the tape between P Y, and raise that part into the position indicated 
by the dotted lines ; the ball would necessarily be pushed forward to E ; 
and if the pen were then drawn towards B on the line D B, the ball would 
be carried up to A, and without deviating in its path from the line Y A. 
Tf A Y were the under side of a flexible pipe or gutter, containing 
water at E in place of the ball, it is obvious that it would also be raised 
to A, in a like manner. By the same principle water is raised in the screw, 
and we may add, in much the same way, for the rotation of the screw is 
merely another mode of effecting the same thing, which we have suppos- 
ed to be done more directly by the pen, i. e. by producing a continual ele- 
vation of the plane immediately behind the ball or the water. The path 
of the latter through a screw is the same as that of the ball, while the 
curves assumed by the tape, as in the dotted lines, represent sections of 
the helix, and the lines D B, A Y, of the cylinder within which it is 
formed. 



All the ancient machines hitherto examined, have come down from pe- 
riods so extremely remote, that not a single circumstance connected with 
their origin or their authors has been preserved. The screw is the first 
machine for raising water, whose inventor, or alleged inventor, has been 
named ; and yet, from the imperfect and mutilated state of such ancient 
writings that incidentally mention it, and the loss of others which treated 
professedly on it, the question of its origin is far from being settled. Al- 
though it is said to have been invented by Archimedes and has long been 
named after him, there are circumstances which render it probable that 
Diodorus Siculus and Atheneus were mistaken when they attributed it 
to the great philosopher of Syracuse. Had the account of this machine 
which Archimedes himself wrote, been preserved, there would have been 
no occasion to reason on its origin or its author ; but unfortunately this, as 
well as his description of pneumatic and hydrostatic engines, " concerning 
which he wrote some books," are among those that have perished. 

There is no reason to believe that Archimedes himself ever claimed its 
invention ; and his countryman Diodorus, who lived two hundred years 
after him, and upon whose authority chiefly it has been attributed to him, 
admits that it was invented by him in Egypt ; thus allowing it to have been 
devised in that country, whence the Greeks derived all or nearly all that 
was valuable in their philosophy and their arts. Every person knows 
that Egypt was the grand school for the nations of old, in which the learn- 
ed men of other countries were instructed in every branch of philosophy — 
for the cultivation of which the Egyptians were celebrated even in the 



142 Origin of the Screw. Book 1 

time of Moses — hence it frequently happened, that after returning to 
their homes imbued with the ' wisdom of Egypt,' philosophers were con- 
sidered by their countrymen as the authors of doctrines, discoveries and 
machines, which they had acquired a knowledge of as pupils abroad. It 
is not therefore impossible, that that which occurred to Thales and Pyth- 
agoras, Lycurgus and Solon, Plato and many others, may also have hap- 
pened to Archimedes with respect to this machine. It has been supposed 
that the screw w T as employed in Egypt ages before he visited that country; 
of this, however, there is no direct proof; perhaps an examination of the 
immense mass of sculptures in the temples, and tombs of Thebes and Beni- 
Hassan, &c. may yet bring to light facts illustrative of the use of this and 
other machines for the same purpose in very remote times. Its ancient 
name of Egyptian screw indicates its origin. 

The silence of Vitruvius respecting its origin, if Archimedes was the 
inventor, is singular ; for through the whole of his work he appears stu- 
dious to record the names of inventors. He was contemporary with 
Diodorus, and had therefore equal opportunities of ascertaining its history, 
while from his profession, and the nature of his work, a more perfect ac- 
count of it would be expected from him than from the other. The 
Roman architect had indeed every inducement, (except such as were un- 
worthy of him,) to record the name of the Prince of Ancient Mathemati- 
cians as its author, if such he knew him to be. The reputation of Ar- 
chimedes; his splendid discoveries; his famous defence of his native, city; 
his melancholy death ; the interest which Marcellus took in his fate ; the 
erection of his tomb by that General ; and its discovery by Cicero amidst 
thorns and rubbish, one hundred and forty years after his death, and in the 
lifetime of Vitruvius — induce us to believe that, as a candid philosopher 
and admirer of learned men, and of Archimedes himself, (B. i, Chap. 1.) 
he would certainly have awarded to the latter the honor of its invention, 
if he believed him entitled to it, either from the testimony of ancient wri- 
ters, or from traditional report. 

But if this machine was not invented by him, to whom then is the 
world indebted for it % We reply — if it really be not more ancient than 
the Ptolemaic era — to a Grecian philosopher of Samos, who was contem- 
porary with Archimedes. Some readers will recollect that when Ptolemy 
Evergetes, the son and successor of Philadelphus, departed on a dangerous 
expedition, the success of which, according to Rollin, was foretold by 
Daniel, (xi, 7, 9,) his wife Berenice, influenced by a principle of supersti- 
tion, that at one time was universal, vow^ed to sacrifice her greatest orna- 
ment, the hair of her head, to the Goddess Venus, if he was successful 
and restored to her in safety. Upon his victorious return, she cut off her 
locks and dedicated them in that temple which Philadelphus had founded 
in honor of her mother Arsinoe ; the dome of which temple was intend- 
ed to have been lined with loadstone, that the iron statue of Arsinoe might 
be suspended in the air ; but the death both of Dinocrates the architect, 
and Philadelphus, prevented the completion of a building that would have 
rivalled the most perfect of all human productions ; a work, which proba- 
bly gave rise to the story of the suspension of Mahomet's coffin. a 

a That metallic substances have been actually suspended without any tangible support 
appears from Poncet, to whose travels in Abyssinia we referred in the last chapter. He 
declares that he beheld in a monastery in that country, a golden staff about four feet 
long, thus suspended in the air ; and to detect any deception he desired permission to 
examine it closely, to ascertain whether there was not some invisible prop or support. 
" To take away all doubt (he says) I passed my cane over it and under it, and on all 
sides, and found that this staff of gold did truly hang of itself in the air." Ed. Encyc. 
Vol. xiii, p. 46. 



Chap. 16.] Invented by Conon of Samos. 143 

Sometime afterwards, this consecrated hair was missing from the tem- 
ple, having been lost through the negligence of the priests, or perhaps 
' designedly concealed. No occurrence was more likely to create alarm 
among a superstitious people, or to excite the ire of a despotic monarch, 
than such an insult to their Gods, and to his favorite queen. lit this di- 
lemma, an astronomer of Alexandria, in order to make his court to Ever- 
getes, had the effrontery to give out publicly that Jupiter had carried off 
the locks of Berenice to heaven, and had formed them into a constellation ! 
And as a proof of his assertion he pointed to an unformed cluster of stars 
near the tail of Leo, as Berenice's hair ! And ' Coma Berenices' is the 
name by which these stars are known to this day. 

It was this artful courtier and astronomer who either invented or re-in- 
vented the screw. He was named Conon of Samos, and sometimes 
Conon of Alexandria, from his residence in Egypt. He was an intimate 
friend of, and greatly esteemed by Archimedes ; and it would seem that 
they communicated their writings and discoveries to each other. When 
the former devised this machine, Archimedes we are told demonstrated 
and fully explained its properties ; for Conon himself was not fortunate in 
his demonstrations. (Bayle.) From this circumstance the name of its in- 
ventor was in time forgotten, and it eventually became known as the Ar- 
chimedian screw ; but probably not till long after the death, both o£ its 
author and illustrator. 

Similar instances are not uncommon in modern times ; they have in fact, 
always occurred. Thus, the instrument known as Hadley's Quadrant was 
really invented by Godfrey of Philadelphia. The compass was known 
before Flavio Gioia, although the Fleur de Lis, by which he desis^nated 
the north in compliment to his sovereign, is used to this day. Gunpowder 
was used ages before Schwartz was born — and these continents bear the 
name of Vespucci, not that of Columbus or Behaim. 

As Conon died before Archimedes, (see Bayle) and probably in Egypt, 
it is very possible (supposing it originated with the former) that it was 
first introduced into Europe by the latter j a circumstance quite sufficient 
to connect his name permanently with it there. Atheneus mentions par- 
ticularly its application by him to raise water from the hold of the ship, 
which was built under his directions for Hiero ; and if an observation of 
the same author can be relied on, it is evident that he was the first to 
make it known to Grecian mariners ; for he asserts, that they held his 
memory in great estimation, for having enabled them to carry off the wa- 
ter from the holds of their vessels by it. 

It is greatly to be regretted that men of science should ever be found 
among the flatterers of despots ; yet the obsequiousness of Conon has been 
imitated in modern as in ancient times. Custom may yet, in some degree 
sanction or rather screen the practice from reproach ; but the period is, 
we believe, rapidly approaching when it will be subjected to general de- 
rision, as not only injurious to the reputation of scientific men themselves, 
but to science and the world at large. Our sentiments on this subject may 
be reprobated by some persons, and approved of by few, — still we believe 
they are such as conduce to the general welfare of our race, and such as will 
one day universally prevail, and believing this, we express them without he- 
sitation — others may condemn them as out of place here, but in our opinion 
the evils they deprecate will not be removed until they are generally de- 
nounced in works devoted to the arts. Nay, we would introduce such 
sentiments into school books, that children may not be taught to worship a 
man on account of his titles, but to revere virtue and admire well culti- 



144 Flatterers of Despots [Book I 

vated talents wherever they are found. ' "We might as well (says Seneca) 
commend a horse for his splendid trappings, as a man for his pompous ad 
ditions.' 

Let any unsophisticated mind peruse the dedications of European works, 
in almost all departments of science, for the last two centuries, and he 
will find every attribute of the Deity blasphemously lavished on the vilest 
of princes, and on titled dolts, with a degree of ardor and apparent sin- 
cerity, that is as loathsome as the grossest practices of heathen idolatry. At 
the same time, these individuals who thus idolize, sometimes an idiot, at 
others an infant, and often a brute, affect pity for the ignorance and super- 
stition of ancient pagans and modern savages. 

But why this display of servile adulation 1 Formerly to obtain bread : 
in later times to procure title, hereditary title. 

If there is one class of men, whose extensive knowledge of nature, 
and the sublimity of whose studies should lead them thoroughly to des- 
pise the tinsel and trappings of courts, and the unnatural, and to the 
great mass, degrading distinctions in European society, it is astronomers ; 
men whose researches are preeminently calculated to ennoble the mind, 
whose labors have elicited the highest admiration of their talents, and 
whose discoveries have opened sources of intellectual pleasures so refined, 
that pure intelligences might rejoice in them. That such men should stoop 
to lay at the feet of ignorant and sensual despots, their fame, their learning, 
and in some degree the science of which they are the conservators, and 
accept from those, who are immeasurably their inferiors, what are prepos- 
terously named titles of honor, i. e. puerile and artificial distinctions, 
which, while they profess to advance those who are already in the fore- 
most ranks of society — really lower and degrade them — titles, relics of 
times when men were advanced but a few steps from the savage state, and 
conferred by ceremonies which are the very essence of buffoonery, — is 
truly one of the most lamentable facts connected with the history of mo- 
dern science. 

Learned men by thus connecting themselves with the state, consummate 
an unholy, an unnatural alliance, and subject even science herself (al- 
though they may not intend it) to politicians to speculate on, They in a 
measure, commit suicide on their fame, by thus supporting political insti- 
tutions, that can only exist by silencing the throbbings and stifling the aspi- 
rations of the general mind after knowledge ; institutions, which, like the 
old errors in philosophy, are destined to be exploded forever. It will, we 
think, one day appear strangely incongruous, that some of the brightest 
luminaries of science should have turned to royal despots for factitious rank; 
as if they, in whose fair fame the world feels an interest, could descend from 
their radiant spheres to move as satellites around such, with an increase 
of lustre ! Who can behold without sorrow, these men rendering homage 
by kneeling and other more disgusting mummeries, to individuals who are 
not only their inferiors in every attribute that adorns humanity, but often the 
most atrocious of criminals, and sometimes mere insensates ; to beg a por- 
tion of honor, and a title to use it ! When the world becomes free and 
enlightened, such examples will be adduced as illustrations of the vaga- 
ries and inconsistencies of the human mind ; and patents of nobility and 
hereditary titles of honor, especially from such sources, will be looked 
upon as satires on science, on the age, and on the intellect of man. 

These titles form the most conspicuous feature in that system of impo- 
sition by which the European world has too long been deluded and de- 
based ; and in a political point of view, the friends of man's inalienable 
rights, and of the amelioration of his condition, will always regret, that 



Chap. 16.] Too often found among Men of Science. 145 

scientific men should have lent their example, to sustain distinctions that 
are a curse to the world. This conduct of theirs, perhaps more than any 
• other cause, tends to uphold despotism on the earth. Of their influence in 
this respect, modern despots are fully aware, and which they evince by 
their anxiety to enlist in their train, every man eminent in any department 
of the arts or of science ; and many of these, it is to be deplored, they too 
often tickle with a feather, or amuse with a trinket, while they put a bridle 
m their lips and yoke them to their cars. 

The lust after titles and distinctions, incident to monarchical govern- 
ments, is in the political and moral world, what the scrofula, or ' king's 
evil' is in the physical : It destroys the healthy and natural organization 
of society, taints its fairest features with hereditary disease, and renders 
the whole corrupt. The wisdom of the fathers of our republic was not 
more conspicuous than their virtue, when they denounced such titles and 
distinctions as forever incompatible with the constitution. Sweep them 
from the earth and man in the eastern hemisphere would become a regene- 
rated being. Nations would no longer be kept in commotion and dread, 
nor their resources be consumed by political and military gladiators ; nor 
would the abominable boast of one people in conquering and plundering 
another be deemed creditable ; but when peace and virtue, science and 
the arts, would alone confer honor, and their most distinguished cultivators 
be deemed the most noble. 

Plato was no worshipper of Dionysius, nor Solon of Croesus ; and 
when the talented but unprincipled Archelaus of Macedon, drew numer- 
ous philosophers around him, by his wealth and the honors he conferred 
on them, Socrates refused even to visit him as long, said he, as bread 
was cheap and water plenty at Athens. 

Although the ancient world confirmed the name given to one of the 
constellations by Conon, the modern one refused to sanction a similar at- 
tempt to designate the remotest planet in our system, after the name of a 
king who was remarkable for his lack of intelligence — a bigot — and who, to 
preserve his prerogative, shed blood as water. Yet to that man, and to 
his son and successor, who, if he possessed more intelligence than the pa- 
rent, was the grossest sensualist of the age, and contact with whom was 
pollution, did some of the votaries of science kneel as to ' the fountains 
of honor!' and to receive a portion of it at their hands! while a, me- 
chanic, to whose glory it will ever be mentioned, could duly appreciate 
the offered bauble and reject it, if not with disdain. James Watt, the ma- 
thematical instrument maker of Glasgow, the great improver of the steam- 
engine, who conferred more benefits on his country than all the monarchs 
that ever ruled over it, and all the statesmen and warriors which it ever 
produced — refused a title. And who ever regretted that Milton was not 
a knight, or Shakespeare a marquis, or Franklin a lord ; or that some of 
the greatest poets and philosophers, philanthropists and mechanicians, that 
ever lived, are known to us simply as such, without having had their 
names bolstered up with preposterous appendages'? And who ever sup- 
posed they were less happy without them, less vigorous and successful in 
their researches ; less respected by contemporaries, or less revered by 
posterity % 

Long after these remarks were written, M. Arago's Memoir of "Watt, 
reached this country, and on perusing it, we could not but smile at the dis- 
appointment expressed by the great French philosopher, that his friend 
was not made &peer. "When I inquired into the cause of this neglect, 
[he observes,] what think you was the response ? Those dignities of 
which you speak, I was told, are reserved for naval and military officers ; 

19 



146 A large Ship built by Archimedes [Book I. 

for influential members of the House of Commons, and for members of the 
aristocracy. ' It is not the custom? and I quote the very phrase, to grant 
these honors to scientific and literary men, to artists and engineers." He 
adds, "so much for the worse for the peerage." Well be it so. In our 
humble opinion, it is so much the better for the memory of Watt. What 
had such a man to do in a house that presses like an incubus on the ener- 
gies of his country, and the claims to a seat in which, are too often such 
as are disgraceful to our common nature % An infinitely higher honor 
awaits him ; for both Watt and his illustrious eulogist are destined to oc- 
cupy distinguished stations in that Pantheon, which is yet to be erected, 
whose doors will be opened only to the BENEFACTORS OF MAN- 
KIND. 



There are several interesting particulars mentioned by Atheneus, respect- 
ing the magnificent ship named the 'Syracusan/ which was built under the 
directions of Archimedes, and to which we have alluded. From the follow- 
ing brief description, it will be perceived, that for richness of decoration ; 
real conveniencies and luxuries, (for even that of a library was not over- 
looked,) she rivalled, if she did not excel, our justly admired packets and 
steam ships. 

Three hundred carpenters were employed in building this vessel, which 
was completed in one year. The timber for the planks and ribs were 
obtained partly from Mount Etna, and partly from Italy ; other materials 
from Spain, and hemp for cordage from the vicinity of the Rhone. She 
was every where secured with large copper nails, [bolts] each of which 
weighed ten pounds and upwards. At equal distances all round the ex- 
terior were statues of Atlas, nine feet in height, supporting the upper 
decks and triglyphs ; besides which the whole outside was adorned with 
paintings; and environed with ramparts or guards of iron, to prevent an 
enemy from boarding her. She had three masts ; for two of these, trees 
sufficiently large were obtained without much difficulty, but a suitable one 
for the mainmast, was not procured for some time. A swine-herd acci- 
dentally discovered one growing on the mountains of Bruttia. She wag 
launched by a few hands, by means of a helix, or screw machine invented 
by Archimedes for the purpose, and it appears that she was sheathed with 
sheet lead. a Twelve anchors were on board, four of which were of wood, 
and eight of iron. Grappling irons were disposed all round, which by 
means of suitable engines could be thrown into enemies' ships. Upon 
each side of this vessel were six hundred young men fully armed, and an 
equal number on the masts and attending the engines for throwing stones. 
Soldiers, [modern marines] were also employed on board, and they were 
supplied with ammunition, i. e. stones and arrows, 'by little boys that 
were below,' [the powder monkies of a modern man of war,] who sent 
them up in baskets by means of pulleys. She had twenty ranges of oars. 
Upon a rampart was an engine invented by Archimedes, which could 
throw arrows and stones of three hundred pounds, to the distance of a 
stadium, [a furlong] besides others for defence, and suspended in chains 
of brass. 

She seems to have been what is now called ' a three decker,' for there 
were ' three galleries or corridors,' from the lowest of which, the sailors 
went down by ladders to the hold. In the middle one, were thirty rooms, 
in each of which were four beds ; the floors were paved with small stones 

a European ships were sheathed with sheet lead in the 17th century, at which time 
also wooden sheathing was in vogue. See Colliers' Diet. Vol. i. Art. England. 



Chap. Ib.J for Hiero, (wo centuries B. C. 147 

of different colors, (mosaics) representing scenes from Homer's Iliad 
.The doors, windows and ceilings were finished with * wonderful art,' and 
embellished with every kind of ornament. The kitchen is mentioned as 
on this deck and next to the stern, also three large rooms for eating. In 
the third gallery were lodgings for the soldiers, and a gymnasium or 
place of exercise. There were also gardens in this vessel, in which 
various plants were arranged with taste ; and among them walks, propor- 
tioned to the magnitude of the ship, and shaded by arbors of ivy and 
vines, whose roots were in large vessels filled with earth. Adjacent to 
these was a room, named the ' apartment of Venus,' the floor of which 
was paved with agate and other precious stones : the walls, roof and 
windows were of cypress wood, and adorned with vases, statues, paint- 
ings, and inlaid with ivory. Another room, the sides and windows of 
which were of box wood, contained a library ; the ceilings represented 
the heavens, and on the top or outside was a sun dial. Another apart- 
ment was fitted up for bathing. The water was heated in three large 
copper cauldrons, and the bathing vessel was made of a single stone of 
variegated colors. It contained sixty gallons. There were also ten sta- 
bles placed on both sides of the vessel, together with straw and corn for the 
horses, and conveniences for the horsemen and their servants. At certain 
distances, pieces of timber projected, upon which were piles of wood, 
ovens, mills, and other contrivances for the services of life. 

At the ship's head was a large reservoir of fresh water, formed of plank 
and pitched. Near it was a conservatory for fish, lined with sheet lead, 
and containing salt water ; although the well or hold was extremely 
deep, one man, Atheneus says, could pump out all the water that leaked 
into her, by a screw pump which Archimedes adapted to that purpose. 
There were probably other hydraulic machines on board, for the plants, 
oathing apparatus, and kitchen, &c. The upper decks were supplied 
with water by pipes of earthenware and of lead ; the latter, most like- 
ly, extending from pumps or other engines that raised the liquid ; for there 
is reason to believe that machines analogous to forcing pumps were at 
that time known. 

The ' Syracusan' was laden with corn and sent as a present to the 
King of Egypt, upon which her name was changed to that of the ' Alex- 
andria.' Magnificent as this vessel was, she appears to have been sur- 
passed by one subsequently built by Ptolemy Philopater ; a description 
of which is given by Montfaucon, in the fourth volume of his antiquities. 

For the Spiral Pump of Wirtz, see the end of the 3d Book 



148 Chain Pump. [Book 1, 



CHAPTER XVII. 

The Chain Pump — Not mentioned by Vitruvius — Its supposed origin — Resemblance between it and 
the common pump — Not used by the Hindoos, Egyptians, Greeks or Romans — Derived from China — 
Description of the Chinese Pump and the various modes of propelling it— Chain Pump from Agricola — 
Paternoster Pumps — Chain Pump of Besson — Old French Pump from Belidor — Superiority of the Chi- 
nese Pump— Carried by the Spaniards and Dutch to their Asiatic possessions — Best mode of making 
and using it — Wooden Chains — Chain Pump in British ships of war — Dampicr— Modern improvements 
— Dutch Pump — Cole's Pump and experiments — Notice of Chain Pumps in the American Navy — De- 
scription of those in the United States Ship Independence — Chinese Pump introduced into America by 
Van Braam — Employed in South America— Recently introduced into Egypt — Used as a substitute for 
Water Wheels— Peculiar feature in Chinese ship building — Its advantages. 

The chain pump, although not described by Vitruvius, is introduced at 
this place, because it seems to be the connecting link between the chain of 
pots and the machine of Ctesibius. Some writers suppose it to be derived 
from the former ; nor is the supposition improbable. Numerous local cir- 
cumstances would frequently prevent the chain of pots from being used 
in a vertical position, and when its direction deviated considerably from 
the perpendicular, some mode of protecting the loaded vessels while as- 
cending rugged banks, &c. became necessary. An open trough or wood- 
en gutter through which they might glide, was a simple and obvious de- 
vice, and one that would occur to most people ; but such a contrivance 
could not have been long in use before the idea must have been suggested, 
that pieces of plank or any solid substance which would occupy the entire 
width of the gutter, might be substituted for the pots, since they would 
obviously answer the same purpose by pushing the water before them 
when drawn up by the chain. If this was the process by which the transi- 
tion of the chain of pots into the chain pump was effected, there can be 
little doubt, that old engineers soon perceived the advantages of covering 
the top of the gutter, and converting it into a tube ; as the machine could 
then be used with equal facility, in a perpendicular, as in any other 
position. 

It may be deemed of little consequence to ascertain the circumstances 
which led to the invention of the chain pump ; yet a knowledge of the 
period when this took place would be of more than usual interest, on ac- 
count of the analogy between it and the ordinary pump, and of the rela- 
tionship that appears to exist between them. The introduction of a tube 
through which water is raised by pallets or pistons, is so obvious an ap- 
proach to the latter, that it becomes desirable to ascertain which of them 
bears the relation of parent to the other, or which of them preceded the 
other. But to what ancient people are we to look for its authors ? Not 
to the Hindoos, or the Egyptians, for it is incredible that either of these 
people sliould have lost it, if it was ever in their possession. Its cheap 
and simple construction — its efficiency and extensive application, would 
certainly have induced them to retain it in preference to others of less 
value. Nor does it appear to have been known to the Greeks ; for their 
navigators would never have employed the screw as a ship pump, (as 
Atheneus says they did,) if they had been acquainted with this machine. 
Of all hydraulic tube machines, the screw seems the most unsuitable 
for such a purpose. It requires to be inclined at an angle that is not only 
inconvenient but generally unattainable in ships. But if the Greeks had 



Chap. 17.J Chain Pump. 149 

the chain pump, the Romans would have received it from them; whereas, 
, from the silence of Vitruvius, it is clear that his countrymen were not ac - 
quainted with it. As an engineer, he would have been sensible of its 
value, and would have preferred it in many cases, in raising water from 
coffer-dams, docks, &c. to the tympanum and noria, which he informs us 
were employed in such cases. a Arch. Book v, Cap. 12. Moreover, if it 
was employed by the Romans, it would have been preserved in use, as 
well as other machines for the same purpose, either in Europe or in 
their African or Asiatic possessions ; but we have no proof of its use at 
all in any of the latter, nor yet in the former, till comparatively modern 
times. 

But if the origin and improvement of the chain pump is due to one 
nation more than another, to whom are we indebted for it? To a people 
as distinguished for their ingenuity and the originality of their inventions, 
as for their antiquity and the peculiarity of many of their customs ; and 
who by their system of excluding all foreigners from entering the country 
have long concealed from the rest of the world many primitive contrivan- 
ces, viz. the Chinese. This singular people appear to have had little 
or no communication with the celebrated nations of antiquity, a cir- 
cumstance to which their ignorance of the chain pump may be attribut- 
ed. This machine has been used in China from time immemorial, and 
as connected with their agriculture, has undergone no change what- 
ever. The great requisites in their husbandry " are manure and wa- 
ter, and to obtain these, all their energies are devoted." Of such im- 
portance is this instrument to irrigate the soil, that every laborer is in 
possession of one ; its use being " as familiar as that of a hoe to every 
Chinese husbandman," " an implement to him not less useful than a spade 
to an European peasant." It is worthy of remark too, that they often use 
it, in what may be supposed to have been its original form, viz. as an open 
gutter ; a circumstance which serves to strengthen the opinion of its origin 
and great antiquity among them. Like the peculiarity of their compass, 
which with them points to the south, it is a proof of their not having received 
it from other people. " The Chinese [observes Staunton] appear indeed 
to have strong claims to the credit of having been indebted only to them- 
selves for the invention of the tools, necessary in the primary and neces- 
sary arts of life ; these have something peculiar in their construction, some 
difference, often indeed slight ; but always clearly indicating that, whether 
better or worse fitted for the same purposes as those in use in other coun- 
tries, the one did not serve as a model for the other." b 

But the general form of chain pumps in China is that of a square 
tube or trunk made of plank ; and of various dimensions acccording to 
the power employed to work them. Those that are portable, with one 
of which every peasant is furnished, are commonly six or seven inches in 
diameter, and from eight to ten feet in length. Some are even longer, for 
Van Braam, who was several years in China, and who, as a native of Hol- 
land, was a close observer of every hydraulic device, when speaking of them, 
remarks, that " they use them to raise water to the height often or twelve 
feet ; a single man works this machine, and even carries it wherever it is 
wanted, as I have had occasion to remark several times in the province of 
Quangtong near Vampou." c A small wheel or roller is attached to each 
end of the trunk, over which an endless chain is passed. Pallets, or 

a It was preferred by the architect of Black Friars Bridge, London, to raise the water 
from the Caissons. 

b Embassy to China. Lon. 1798. Vol. iii, 102. 

c Embassy of the Dutch E. I. Company. Lon. 1798. Vol. i. 75. 



150 



Chinese Chain Pump. 



[Book I 



square pieces of plank, fitted so as to fill (like the piston of a common 
pump) the bore of the tube, are secured to the chain. When the machine 
is to be used, one end of the trunk is placed in the water, and the other 
rests on the bank over which it is to be raised. The upper wheel or roller 
is put in motion by a crank applied to its axle, and the pallets as they ascend 
the trunk, push the water that enters it before them, till it is discharged 
above. In machines of this description one half of the chain is always 
outside of the tube and exposed to view, but in others the trunk is divided 
by a plank, so as to form two separate tubes, one above another, and hence 
the chain rises in the lower one and returns down the upper. These 
pumps are represented as exceedingly effective, delivering a volume of 
water equal to the bore of the trunk. Whenever a breach occurs in one 
of their canals, or repairs are to be made, hundreds of the neighboring 
peasants are summoned to the work, and in a few hours will empty a large 
section of it by these machines. 

When a pump is intended to raise a great quantity of water at once, it 
is made proportionably larger, and is moved by a very simple tread wheel : 
or rather by a series of wooden arms projecting from various parts of a 
.lengthened axle, which imparts motion to the chain, as represented in the 
figure. 




No. 64. Chinese Chain Pump. 

These arms are shaped like .the letter T, and the upper side of each is 
made smooth for the foot to rest on. The axle turns upon two upright 
pieces of wood, kept steady by a pole stretched across them. The ma- 
chine being fixed, men treading upon the projecting arms, and supporting 
themselves upon the beam across the uprights, communicate a rotary mo- 
tion to the chain, the pallets attached to which draw up a constant and 
copious stream of water. Another mode of working them, which Staun- 
ton observed only at Chu-san, was by yoking a buffalo, or other animal, to 
a large horizontal cog wheel, working into a vertical one, fixed on the 



Chap. 17.] Paternoster Pumps.* 151 

same shaft with the wheel that imparts motion to the chain, as represent- 
ed in figures 49 and 54. a The description of this machine by Staunton is 
similar to that previously given by the missionaries, and they enumerate the 
various modes of propelling it which he has mentioned. b But Nieuhoff, 
with the characteristic sagacity of his countrymen, noticed either 'these, or 
some other machines for the same purpose, propelled by wind. When 
speaking of the populous city of Caoyeu, and its environs, he observes, 
" they boast likewise of store of windmills, whose sails are made of mats. 
The great product of the country consists of rice, which the peasant 
stands obliged to look after very narrowly, lest it perish upon the ground 
by too much moisture, or too much heat and drought. The windmills, 
therefore, are to draw out the water in a moist season, and to let it in as 
they think fit." That part of the country, he continues, is " full of such 
mills." Several of them are represented in a plate, but without showing 
the pumps moved by them. c 

These were very likely to elicit the notice of a Dutchman ; for draining 
mills, worked by horses and wind, have been used in Holland since the 
14th century. They consisted however principally of the noria and 
chain of pots. 

It is uncertain when the chain pump was first employed in Europe ; 
whether it was made known by Marco Paulo, Ibn Batuta, or subsequent 
vravelers in China, or was previously developed and introduced into use, 
independently of any information from abroad. An imperfect machine is 
described by several old authors. This was a common pump log, or 
wooden cylinder placed perpendicularly in a well ; its upper end reach- 
ing above the level to which the water was to be raised, and having a 
lateral spout, as in ordinary pumps, for the discharge. A pulley was se- 
cured to one side of the log near the lower orifice, and a drum or wheel 
above the upper one. One end of a rope was let down the cylinder, and 
after being passed over the pulley was drawn up on the outside, and both 
ends were then spliced or united over the drum. To this rope, a number 
of leathern bags or stuffed globular cushions were secured at regular dis- 
tances. The diameter of each was equal to the bore of the cylinder. Ribs 
were nailed across the periphery of the drum, and between these, the 
cushions were so arranged as to fall, in order to prevent the rope from 
slipping. When the drum was put in motion, the cushions entered in suc- 
cession the lower orifice of the pump, (which was two or three feet below 
the surface of the water,) and pushed up the liquid before them, till it es- 
caped through the spout. 

Machines of this description were formerly employed in mines ; chains 
of iron being substituted for the ropes, and sometimes globes of metal in 
place of the cushions. The latter are figured by Kircher in his Mundus 
Subterraneus, Tom. ii, 194. Among the earliest of modern authors 
who have described these pumps is Agricola. He has given five differ- 
ent figures of them, but they differ merely in the apparatus for working 
them, according to the power employed, whetherof men, animals, or water. 
The following cut, No. 65 is from his ' De Re Metallica.' It exhibits two 
separate views of the lower end of the pump, showing the mode of attach- 
ing the pulley, and the passage of the rope and cushions over it. From the 
resemblance of the chains or ropes and cushions, to the rosary, or string 
of beads on which Roman catholics count their prayers, these machines 

a Staunton, Vol. iii, 315. «• Duhalde's China. Paris, 1735. Tom. ii, 66, 67. 
c Ogilvy's Translation. Lon. 1673, pp. S4, 85 — and Histoire Generale. Amsterdam, 
1749. Tom. viii, 81, 82. 



152 



Chain Tump from Agricola.. 



[Book I, 



became known as ' Paternoster pumps.' For the same reason they are 
named Chapelet by the French, in common with the chain of pots. 




No. 65. Chain Pump from Agricola. 

The next author who describes these pumps, that has fallen in our way, 
is Besson. Plate 50, of his ' Theatre Des Instrumens,' is a representation 
of a double one. Two cylinders are placed parallel to each other, so that 
the chain passes through both. It is shown as worked by wind. A ver- 
tical shaft with sails is secured under the dome of an open tower ; a cog 
wheel on the lower end of the shaft turns a trundle or pinion which is fix- 
ed on the horizontal axle of the drum, that carries the chain. Thus, when 
the wind turned the sails, water was raised through one of the cylinders, 
and when their motion was reversed by change of the wind, the liquid was 
elevated in the other. Instead of stuffed cushions, as in the preceding 
figure, pistons, resembling somewhat those of fire engines, or forcing 
pumps, i. e. double cupped leathers are shown, (' Coquilles fond contre 
fond,' J the earliest instance of their use that we have met with. Besson, 
who appears to claim the addition of the second cylinder as an improve 
ment of his own, was a French mathematician and mechanician, and 
spent a great part of his life in mechanical researches ; in the prose- 
cution of which he visited foreign countries. His • Theatre' contains 
such devices as he collected abroad as well as those invented by himself. 
It was published at Lyons, with commentaries, after his decease, by 
Beroald, but the privilege to print was accorded to himself, ten years pre- 
vious to the date of its publication, i. e. in 1568. a 

Kircher also figures the chain pump with two cylinders. The imper- 
fect mechanism and enormous friction of these old machines confined 
their application to a limited extent in Europe during the 16th and 17th 
centuries. Desaguliers left them unnoticed ; and at the time Switzer 
wrote (1729) they had been discontinued in England. "I might (he ob- 
serves) from Bockler and others, have produced almost an infinite number 

a Bayle, in his dictionary, says Beroald was twenty-two years of age when he publish- 
ed " some commentaries on the mechanics of James Besson ; but he had scarce tried 
his fortune that way, when he ran after the philsopher's stone." 



Chap. 17.] 



Old French Chain Pump. 



153 



of drafts of engines, which are placed under the terms Budromia and 
Hydrotechnema, &c. the first signifying the methods of raising water by 
buckets ; and the other by globes or figures of any regular shape, fixed 
to a rope, which rope being fastened at each end, and passing through an 
elm or other pipe, which reaches from the bottom of a well to the height 
to which the water h to be conveyed, brings up the water with it ; but 
these kini of engines "being out of date, I shall pass over them." a Belidor 
has described one that was used in the ship yards and docks at Marseilles, 
which is represented in No. 66. The lower pulley was dispensed with ; 
and the face of the pallets or pistons, which were hemispheres of wood, 
were leathered. It was worked by two galley slaves, who were relieved 
every hour. 




No. 66. Old French Chain Pump. 

Such appears to have been the general construction of the chain pump 
in Europe, until an increasing intercourse with the Chinese led to the in- 
troduction of the machine as made by that people. The credit of this 
is, we believe, due to the Dutch. From the peculiar location of Holland 
with regard to the sea, hydraulic engines have at all times been of too 
much importance to escape the examination of her intelligent travelers. 
But it perhaps will be said, there is no essential or very obvious distinction 
between the old chain pump of Europe and that of China : admitting this, 
still there must have been something peculiar either in the construction or 
mode of working the latter, to have produced the superior results ascrib- 
ed to them ; and to have elicited the admiration of the Jesuits and all the 
early travelers in China. No stronger proof of their superiority need be 
adduced, than the fact of their being carried in the 17th century from 
China to Manilla by the Spaniards, and to Batavia by the Dutch* Hence 
they were previously unknown in those parts of Asia, as much so as in 
Holland and Spain. Navarrette mentions them with great praise : he 
thought there was not a better invention in the world to draw water from 
wells and tanks. And €ramelli (in 1695) describes them as machines, 
which, in his opinion, Chinese ingenuity alone could invent. d Montanus 
mentioned them as novel. He describes one as an " engine made of four 
square plank, holding great store of water, which with iron chains, they 

*Hydrostaticks, 313. b Histoire Generate, Tom. viii, 81. c Ibid. d Ibid, Tom. vii, 267 

20 



154 Chain Pumps in Ships. [Book L 

hale up like buckets." 3 How suck intelligent men as the Jesuits undoubt- 
edly were, could use such language, if an effective chain pump was then 
known in Europe, it is difficult to conceive. 

Although the Chinese pump has been mentioned by all travelers, no 
one has entered sufficiently into details, to enable a mechanic to realize the 
construction of the chain — mode of fixing the pallets — where they are 
attached to it, (at the centre, or on one side,) — nor how they are car- 
ried over the wheels or rollers. One cause of the superiority of these 
oriental machines over those of Europe, was the small degree of fric- 
tion from the rubbing of the pallets, when passing through the trunk ; wood 
sliding readily over wood, when both are wet : another was the accuracy 
with which the working parts were made. The experience of ages, and the 
immense number of workmen constantly employed in fabricating them, 
through every part of the empire, had brought them to great perfection : but 
the position in which they are worked, also contributed to increase the quan- 
tity of water raised by them, for except in particular locations, they are al- 
ways inclined to the horizon, as shown in No. 64. Now it has been ascer- 
tained that to construct and use a chain pump to the best advantage, the dis- 
tance between the pallets should be equal to their breadth, and the inclination 
of the trunk about 24°, 21'. When thus arranged, according to Belidor, it 
produces a maximum effect.** The author just named speaks of one at 
Strasburgh, the chain of which was made of wood, which being light 
and flexible, was very efficient, requiring much less labor to work it than 
those in which the chains were iron. This leads us to a remark which 
we do not recollect to have seen in any English work, viz. that in most 
if not in all the Chinese smaller pumps, the chains are of that material. 
One of them is thus described by the Jesuits : " Une machine hydraulique, 
dont le jeu est aussi simple que la composition. Elle est composee d'une 
chaine de hois, ou d'une sorte de chapelet de petites planches quarrees de 
six ou sept pouces, qui sont comme enfilee parallelement a d'egales dis- 
tances. Cette chaine passe dans un tube quarre," &c. c 

In the latter part of the 17th century, chain pumps were used in 
British men-of-war. In Dampier's Voyage to New Holland in the 'Roe- 
buck,' a national vessel, he mentions one. This ship on returning home 
sprung a leak near the Island of Ascension, and the water poured in so 
fast, he relates, that " the chain pump could not keep her free — I set the 
hand pump to work also, and by ten o'clock, sucked her — I wore the ship 
and put her head to the southward, to try if that would ease her, and on 
that tack the chain pumjj just kept her free." English ships of war now 
carry four of those pumps, and three common ones, all fixed in the same 
well ; whereas it would appear from Dampier, that they had formerly but 
one of each. " In the afternoon, (he observes,) my men were all employed 
pumping with both pumps." Shortly afterwards the ship foundered. d The 
vessels of Columbus were furnished with punxps ; and so were those of 
Magalhanes ; but these were probably the common instruments referred to 
above as ' hand pumps.' e 

In Dampier's time chain pumps were very imperfect. The chain, and 
the wheel, which carried it, were inaccurately and badly made ; hence 
when the machine was worked, the former was constantly liable to slip 
over the latter ; and the consequent violent jerks, from the great weight 
of the water on the pallets, often burst the chain asunder, and under cir- 

* Atlas Chinensis, translated by Ogilvy. Lon, 1671, page 675. 

b Arch. Hydraulique, Tom. i, 363. c Histoire Generale, Tom. viii, 82, and Duhalde 
Tom. ii, 66. d Dampier's Voyages, Vol. iii, 191, 193. 
e Irving's Columbus Vol ii, 127, and Burney's Voyages, Vol. i, 112. 



Chap. 17.] 



British Chain Pump, 



lob 



cumstances winch rendered it difficult and sometimes impossible to repair 
it. These defects, which in some cases led to the loss of vessels and of hu- 
man life, at length excited the attention of European mechanics, and in 
the following century, numerous projects were brought forward, to im- 
prove the chain pump, or to supersede it. In 1760, Mr. Abbot invented a 
ship pump, which was represented as of a very simple construction, and 
which threw " five hundred hogsheads of water in a minute ; [!] the 
handle by which it is worked, is in the manner of a common winch, 
which turns with the utmost facility either to the right or the left." a In the 
following year, the States of Holland granted to M. Liniere, " an exclusive 
privilege for twenty-five years, for a pump, which upon trial on board a 
Dutch man-of-war, and in the presence of the commissioners of the ad- 
miralty, being worked by three men, raised from a depth of twenty-two 
feet, four tons of water in a minute, that is, 240 tons of water in an hour." b 
In 1768, Mr. Cole introduced some considerable improvements in English 
ship pumps. An experiment made in that year is very interesting, as it 
shows the imperfections of the old ones, especially the enormous amount 
of friction to which they were subject. " Lately, a chain pump on a new 
construction was tried on board his Majesty's ship Seaford, in Block 
House Hole, which gave great satisfaction. There were present, Admiral 
Sir John Moore, a number of sea officers and a great many spectators 
The event of the trial stands thus : 



The New Pump, Mr. Cole's : 
Four men pumped out one ton of 

water in 43^- seconds. 
Two men pumped out one ton in 

55 seconds." 



The Old Pump : 
Seven men pumped out one ton 

in 76 seconds. 
Four men pumped out one ton 

in 55 seconds. 
Two men could not move it." c 



The chain in Cole's pump was made like a watch chain, or those which 
communicate motion to the pistons of ordinary fire engines, i. e. every 
other link was formed of tw r o plates of iron, whose ends lapped over 
those of a single one, and secured by a bolt at each end. These bolts 
formed a joint on which they moved ; but instead of their ends being 
riveted, one was formed into a button head, and a slit made through the 
other, for the admission of a spring key, so that they could be taken out. 
at pleasure. By this device, whenever a link or bolt was broken or worn 
out, another one, from a store of them kept on hand for the purpose, could 
be supplied in a few moments. In some experiments, the chain was pur- 
posely separated, and dropped into the well in a ship's hold, whence it 
was taken up, repaired, and the pump again set to work in two minutes. 
Chains similar to these had been previously employed by Mr. Mylne in 
the pumps that raised the water from the caissons at Black Friars Bridge. 

The pistons were formed of two plates of brass or iron, having a disk of 
thick leather between them, of the same diameter as the bore of the pump. 
The edges of the leathers, when wet, do not bear hard against the sides of 
the pump ; indeed it is not necessary that they should even touch ; for the 
water that escapes past one, is received into the next compartment below ; 
and when a rapid motion is imparted to the pistons, the inertia of the mov- 
ing column prevents in a great measure any from descending. The wheel 
which carries the chain is generally made like the trundles in mills, viz. 
two thin iron disks or rings are secured about eight or nine inches apart, 
upon the axle, and are united by several bolts at their circumference. The 



a London Magazine for 1760, p. 321 b Ibid. 1762, p. 283. c Ibid. 1768, p. 



156 



Chain "Pumps 



[Book I 



distance between these bolts is such that the pistons fall in between 
them, and are carried round by them. Sometimes however, the links 
have hooks, which take hold of the bolts. A lower wheel is now 
dispensed with, and the end of the pump slightly curved towards the 
descending chain, to facilitate the entrance of the pistons. These ma- 
chines are generally worked in ships of war by means of a long crank 
attached to the axle, at which a number of men can work. In some ves- 
sels they are moved by a capstan. 11 The pump cylinders are of iron, and 
sometimes of brass, the latter being inclosed within and protected by 
wooden ones. 




No. 67. Chain Pump in the U. S. Ship Independence. 

For the "following facts connected with the use of the chain pump in 
the United States Navy, we are indebted to Mr. Hart, Naval Constructor 
in the New- York Navy Yard. The first United States ship of war, 
which had one, was the ' Boston,'' built at Boston, in 1799. Mr. Hart's 
father made the pump. The chain was formed of common ox chains, 
and the wheel which carried it was of wood, having forked pieces of iron 
driven into its periphery, between which the chain was received : the cyl- 
inders were common pump logs of six inches bore. This imperfect ma- 
chine was replaced the following year, by one formed after a French 
model, the chain and cylinders being of copper. In 1802, the Frigate Con- 
stitution had two similar ones placed in her ; and about the same time, 
they were adopted in other public vessels ; but in the course of a few 
years were discontinued generally, either from the prejudice of the 
seamen, or from the increased labor and expense of repairing the pis- 
tons. In ordinary pumps, a single box or piston only, has to be re-leath- 



a The vessels of the exploring expedition sent. out by the British admiralty, under the 
command of Capt. Owen, had their chain pumps fitted to work by the capstan, under 
the impression that it was a more economical mode than the crank, of applying per- 
sonal labor. ' Narrative of Voyages to explore the shores of Africa, Arabia and Mada- 
gascar, in 1821.' Vol i, p. 14. N.York Ed. 1833. 



Chap. 17.] in American S?dps. 157 

ered ; but in the chain pump, from thirty to fifty have to be renewed 
when worn out. The chain pumps in the British sloop of war Cyant 
were taken out when she was captured, and common pumps put in 
their place. Recently a change of opinion respecting these pumps has 
taken place, for within a few years they have to a limited extent *been re- 
introduced into the navy. In 1837, the Independence was furnished with 
two of them ; and in 1838, the same number were placed in the Ohio r 
both vessels still retain the ordinary pumps. 

A description of one of those on board the Independence, which is now- 
fitting for sea in this harbor, will give a correct idea of them all. See No. 67. 

Two copper cylinders, seven inches diameter, and about twenty-two 
feet long, extend from the surface of the main gun-deck to the well. The 
one in which the chain descends, is continued ten or twelve inches above 
the deck to prevent the water that is raised, from returning through it 
again to the well. A horizontal wrought iron shaft is placed between the 
cylinders and supported by a stout frame on which its journals turn. On 
this shaft, a strong cast iron wheel, two feet in diameter, is secured, having 
twelve arms radiating like the spokes of a carriage wheel from the hub. A 
(No. 67) represents two of these arms with a portion of the shaft. A re- 
cess is formed at the extremities to receive the chain, and prevent it from 
slipping off on either side. Figs. 1 and 2, represent the links. They are 
of copper, seven inches long, one and a half inch wide, and one quarter 
of an inch thick, and are similar to those in Cole's pumps. The pallets or 
pistons are formed on the middle of every alternate link ; that is, on those 
which are made of a single piece. A circular plate about a quarter of an 
inch thick, is cast (see fig. 1,) of a diameter rather less than the bore of 
the cylinders. Another loose plate of the same dimensions (fig. 3,) has 
an opening in its centre to allow it to pass over the link and lay upon the 
other. Between these, a disk of leather is introduced, i. e. a circular 
piece just like fig. 3, but of a diameter equal to the bore of the cylinder. 
This is first placed on the fixed plate in fig. 1, then fig. 3 is laid over it, 
and to secure the whole, a key or wedge is driven through a slit in the 
link, just above the surface of fig. 3, and thus compresses the leather be- 
tween them. "When the pumps are used, long cranks are applied to each 
end of the shaft, so that fifteen or twenty men can be engaged at the same 
time in working them. In the Independence, these cranks extend across, the 
deck, and thereby interrupt the passage way. They should in all public 
vessels be arranged, if possible, ' fore and aft.' The arrows show the di- 
rection of the chain. 

The introduction of the chain pump into ships is probably due to the 
Chinese, as they use it in their sea junks; and it is not likely that this ap- 
plication of it is of recent date among them. a The early missionaries 
thought that buckets only were employed in raising bilge water from 
the holds. It is not much used we believe in the French navy. In the 
Dictionnaire de Trevoux, it is named the English pump. 

The Chinese chain pump was introduced into the United States by 
Andre Everard Van Braam, who was several years chief of the Dutch 
East India Company in China, and who settled in South Carolina at the 
close of the revolutionary war. In 1794, he was appointed second in the 
Dutch embassy to Pekin, and in 1796, he returned and settled near Phila- 
delphia. In his account of the embassy, a translation of which was pub- 
lished at London in 1798, and dedicated by him to General Washington, 
and to which we have heretofore referred — he remarks, speaking of the 



The Chinese,' by J. F. Davis, vol. ii, 290 



158 Chinese SJiip-building. [Book i 

Chinese pumps, " I have introduced the use of them into the United 
States of America, where they are of great utility in rivers, in conse- 
quence of the little labor they require." (Vol. i, 74.) We are not aware 
that they are much used in this country at the present time. The chain 
pump is employed in the diamond districts of Brazil. M. Mawe, in his 
Travels, has figured and described it as used there. It has also been re- 
cently introduced into Egypt, where it is more likely to become domi- 
ciliated, than the atmospheric and forcing pump, which Belzoni endeavored 
in vain to establish ; although St. John seems to think even it is rather 
too complex for the present state of the mechanic arts in the land of the 
Pharaohs. " Windmills for raising water, and chain pumps, have been 
introduced into Egypt; but as these are machines which require some re- 
gard to the principles of good workmanship, they are by no means fitted 
for general use." Egypt and Mohammed Ali, vol. i, 14. 

The chain pump, as well as the screw, noria, chain of pots, &c. has 
been adopted as a first mover. Placed perpendicularly on the side of a 
precipice, or wherever a small stream of water can be conveyed into its 
upper orifice, and can escape from its lower one, the motion of the chain 
is reversed by the weight of the liquid column acting on the pistons. A 
wheel similar to the upper one is fixed below, over which the chain also 
passes ; and from the axle of either wheel the power may be taken. A 
patent for this application of the chain pump was granted in England, 
in 1784. 

There is another device of the Chinese, which is worthy of imitation ; 
and considering the increased security it offers to floating property, and 
the additional safety of the lives of navigators, it is surprising that it has 
not been adopted by Americans and Europeans — viz. the division of the 
holds of ships by water-tight partitions. The Chinese divide the holds 
of their sea vessels into about a dozen distinct compartments with strong 
plank ; and the seams are caulked with a cement composed of lime, oil, 
and the scrapings of bamboo. This composition renders them imper- 
vious to water, and is greatly preferable to pitch, tar and tallow, since it is 
said to be incombustible. This division of their vessels seems to have 
been well experienced ; for the practice is universal throughout the em- 
pire. Hence it sometimes happens that one merchant has his goods safely 
conveyed in one division, while those of another, suffer considerable da- 
mage from a leak in the compartment in which they are placed. A ship 
may strike against a rock and vet not sink, for the water entering by the 
fracture will be confined to the division where the injury occurs. To the 
adoption of a similar plan in European or American merchantmen, beside 
the opposition of popular prejudice and the increased expense, an objec- 
tion might arise from the reduction it would occasion in the quantity of 
freight, and the increased difficulty of stowing bulky articles. It remains 
to be considered how far these objections ought to prevail against the 
greater security of the vessel, crew and cargo. At any rate, such objec- 
tions do not apply to ships of war, in which to carry very heavy burdens, 
23 not an object of consideration. Staunton's Embassy, vol. ii, 136. 



Chap. 18.] Ancient America. 1 59 



CHAP TER XVIII. 

On the hydraulic works of the ancient inhabitants of America : Population of Anahuac — Ferocity of the 
Spanish invaders — Subject of ancient hydraulic works interesting — Aqueducts of the Toltecs — Ancient 
Mexican wells — Houses supplied with water by pipes — Palace of Motezuma— Perfection of Mexican 
works in metals — Cortez — Market in ancient Mexico — Hydraulic works — Fountains and jets d'eau — No- 
ria and other machines — Palenque : its aqueducts, hieroglyphics, &c. — Wells in ancient and modern 
Yucatan — Relics of former ages, and traditions of the Indians. Hydraulic works of the Peruvians : 
Customs relating to water — Humanity of the early Incas — Aqueducts and reservoirs — Resemblance of 
Peruvian and Egyptian customs — Garcilasso — Civilization in Peru before the times of the Incas — Giants 
— Wells — Stupendous aqueducts, and other monuments — Atabalipa — Pulleys — Cisterns of gold and sil- 
ver in the houses of the Incas — Temples and gardens supplied by pipes — Temple at Cusco: its water 
works and utensils — Embroidered cloth — Manco Capac. 

It has been a subject of regret, that we have been unable to obtain any 
specific information, respecting the employment of machines to raise 
water on the American continents, previous to the visit of Europeans in 
the 15th and 16th centuries. And yet there can, we think, be scarcely a 
doubt, that in those countries where civilization and the arts had made 
considerable progress, as Peru, Chili, Guatimala, and Mexico, such ma- 
chines had long been in use. Unfortunately, accounts of those countries 
by early European writers, contain little else than details of the success- 
ful villany of those savage adventurers, who, under the cloak of religion, 
and by the most revolting perfidy, robbed the natives of their indepen- 
dence, their property, and myriads of them of their lives. 

It is impossible to reflect on the great population of ancient Anahuac — 
the progress which the natives had made in the arts — the separation of 
trades and professions — their extensive manufactures — the splendor of 
their buildings — their laws — the rich produce of their highly cultivated 
fields — the freedom and prosperity of the republics of Tlascala, and the 
comparative general happiness of the inhabitants ; with the utter desola- 
tion brought on them and their country by the Spaniards — without feeling 
emotions of unmitigated indignation. No one can read even Bolts, the 
advocate of Cortez and the palliator of his conduct, without being thrilled 
with horror at the uniform treachery, cruelty, and blasphemy of that man 
His watchword of ' the Holy Ghost/ while slaughtering the natives on one 
occasion like sheep, conveys but an imperfect idea of his ferocity and in- 
difference to their sufferings, and of the disgusting affectation of promoting 
Christianity, under which he pretended to act. ' Religion,' says Solis, ' was 
always his principal care.' The Spaniards affected to shudder at the san- 
guinary gods of the Mexicans, which required human sacrifices — while 
they immolated in cold blood, hecatombs of the natives to the demons 
they themselves worshipped — viz. avarice and dominion — until the land 
was filled with slaughter, and whitened with the bones of their victims. 
It is said, that " in seventeen years, they destroyed above six millions 
of them." No romance ever equalled in horror the tragedies per- 
formed by Almagro, Valdivia, Cortez and Pizarro — and yet these men 
have been held up as examples of heroism, and our youth have been 
taught to admire, and of course to emulate ' the glory of Cortez.' 

It is more than probable that the people, who, in remote times, in- 
habited the southern continent and Mexico, remains of some of whos^ 



160 Hydraulic Works [Book I 

works, rival in magnitude those of Egypt and India, and many of 
them, (the roads and aqueducts particularly,) equalled in utility the 
noblest works of Greece and Rome — were not without hydraulic en- 
gines ; and had descriptions of them been preserved, they would have 
furnished more interesting, and perhaps more certain data, respecting the 
peopling of America, and of the origin of the Toltec and Astec races, 
than any others derived from the useful arts. From the analogy there is 
between some of the arts, manners, and customs of the ancient people of 
Mexico and South America, and those of Asia, we might suppose that the 
swape, bucket and windlass, noria, and chain of pots, and perhaps the 
chain pump were known to them ; but of this we have met with no direct 
proof. Were the fact established, that they were in possession of these 
machines, it would greatly tend to prove their Asiatic origin in post- 
diluvian times ; while on the other hand, if lacking these, they had others 
peculiar to themselves, such a fact would be one of the most interesting 
circumstances connected with the early history of these continents ; and 
might be adduced to sustain the hypothesis of those who consider this 
hemisphere as having been uninterruptedly occupied by man, from times 
anterior to Noah's flood ; and consequently many of the machines, arts, 
and productions of the inhabitants peculiar to themselves. 

The Toltecs, we are informed, introduced the cultivation of maize and 
cotton ; they built cities, made roads, and constructed those great pyramids 
which are yet admired ; and of which the faces are very accurately laid 
out ; they could found metals, and cut the hardest stone — they knew the 
use of hieroglyphical painting, and they had a solar year, more perfect 
than that of the Greeks and Romans. " Few nations (says Humboldt) 
moved such great masses as were moved by the Mexicans," proofs of 
which are still found among the ruins of their temples. The calender 
stone, and the sacrifice stone, in the great square at Mexico, containing 
282 and 353 cubic feet ; a carved stone dug up, which was upwards of 
22 feet in length, 19 feet in breadth, and. about 10 deep — are examples; and 
the colossal statue of the Goddess Teoyaomiqui, is another. 51 And what is 
more to our purpose, remains of aqueducts, of surprising magnitude and 
workmanship, are found throughout Chili, Mexico, and Peru. 

Nor had these arts been lost at the period of the Spanish invasion. At 
that time, agriculture, artificial irrigation, and many other of the mechanic 
arts, especially those which relate to the metals, appear to have been in 
a more advanced state, than they have ever been in Spain, during any 
subsequent period. When Grijalva and his companions landed in Yuca- 
tan, (in 1518) they were astonished at the cultivation of the fields, and the 
beauty of the edifices — as well as at the ornaments, &c. in gold, which the 
natives possessed, the value of the workmanship often ' exceeding that of 
the metal.'' Tlascala, (says Solis,) was at that period, M a very populous 
city ;" the houses were built of stone and brick, their roofs were flat and 
surrounded with galleries. The Tlascalans, says Herrera, had baths, bow- 
ers, and fountains^ and whenever a new house was finished, they had feasts 
and dancing, &c. like the house warming of old in Europe. Every house 
in Zempoala had a garden with water. Ancient wells are still in use in 
Mexico, some of which are two and three hundred feet in depth. Water 
is drawn from them to irrigate the soil. 

The city of Cholula was located in a delightful plain ; it contained 
20,000 inhabitants, and the number in its suburbs was greater. The 



a Clavigero eays, columns of stone of one piece, 80 feet long, and 20 feet in circum- 
ference, were extant in his time, in the edifices of Micilan. Mexico, Vol. i, 420. 



Chap. 18.] in Ancient Mexico. 161 

Spaniards compared it to Valladolid for its beauty and magnificence. 
It was a great emporium of merchandise. Strangers from distant parts of 
the continent nocked to it. Solis says, the streets were wide and well laid 
out; the buildings larger and of better architecture than those of Tlascala, 
and the inhabitants were principally merchants and mechanics. Cortez 
himself, after entering this city, thus speaks of it in a letter to Charles V. 
" The inhabitants are better clothed than any we have hitherto seen. Peo- 
ple in easy circumstances wear cloaks above their dress; these cloaks 
differ from those of Africa, for they have pockets, though the cut, cloth 
and fringes are the same. The environs of the city are very fertile and 
well cultivated. Almost all the fields may be watered ; and the city is 
much more beautiful than all those in Spain ; for it is well fortified, and 
built on level ground. I can assure your highness, that from the top of a 
mosque (temple) I reckoned more than four hundred towers, all of mosques. 
The number of inhabitants is so great that there is not an inch of ground 
uncultivated." When the Spaniards reached Tezcuco, they found it as 
large again as Seville. It rivalled in grandeur and extent Mexico itself, 
and was of a much more ancient date than that capital. Herrera says, 
the streets were very regular, and that fresh water was brought in pipes 
from the mountains to every house. The principal front of the buildings 
extended on the borders of a spacious lake, where the causeway that lea 
to Mexico began. It was from this causeway, which was built of stone 
and lime, that the Spaniards first beheld the distant capital, with its towers 
and pinnacles in the midst of the lake ; and on the 8th November, 1519, 
Cortez and his myrmidons entered that city, which then contained a great- 
er population than New- York does at present ; for it had between three 
and four hundred thousand inhabitants. 

When the Spaniards entered the gates, through a bulwark of stone 
supported by castles, they beheld a spacious street with houses uniformly 
built, and the windows and battlements filled with spectators. They 
were received into one of Motezuma's houses, which had been built by 
his father. This building, Solis remarks, vied in extent, with the principal 
palaces of emperors in Europe ; and had the appearance of a fortress,, 
with thick stone walls and towers upon the flanks. The streets of the city 
were straight, as if drawn by a line ; and the public buildings, and houses 
of the nobility, which made up the greatest part of the city, were of stone 
and well built. The palace of Motezuma was so large a pile that it 
opened with thirty gates into as many different streets. The principal 
front took up one entire side of a spacious parade, and was of black, red 
and white jasper, well polished. Over the gates were the arms or sym- 
bolical figures of Motezuma or his predecessors, viz. a griffin, being half 
an eagle and half a lion ; the wings extended and holding a tiger in its 
talons. The roofs of the buildings were of cypress, cedar, and other 
odoriferous woods, and were ornamented with carvings of " different 
foliages and relievos." But without referring to the splendor of this un- 
fortunate monarch's court, his luxurious mode of living, his treasures, the 
chair of burnished gold in which he was carried to meet Cortez, the jew- 
els of gold, pearls, and precious stones, that adorned his person and those 
of his attendants, and the " shoes of hammered gold," that were bound to 
his feet and legs with straps, like the Roman military sandals ; it will be 
sufficient to notice the market of the city for the sale of merchandise, in 
order to realize a tolerably correct idea of the state of the arts among the 
Mexicans. Nothing excited the surprise of the Spaniards so much as 
this market — both as regarded the quantity, variety, and quality of the 
goods sold, and the order which prevailed. 

21 



162 Mechanic Arts of the Mexicans. [Book I. 

The Mexican works of gold and silver, sent by Cortez to Charles V. 
says Clavigero, " filled the goldsmiths of Europe with astonishment.'' 
" Some of them were inimitable." Among others, there were fishes having 
scales alternately of gold and silver — a parrot with moveable head, tongue, 
and icings — an ape with moveable head and feet, and having a spindle 
in its hand, in the attitude of spinning. Vol. i, 413. 

Cortez, in a letter to Charles V. dated October 1520, says, " the market 
place is twice as large as that of Seville and surrounded with an immense 
portico, under which are exposed for sale all sorts of merchandise, eata- 
bles, ornaments made of gold, silver, lead, pewter, precious stones, bones, 
shells, and feathers ; delft ware, leather, and spun cotton. We find hewn 
stone, tiles, and timber fit for building. There are lanes for game, others 
for roots and garden fruits. There are houses where barbers shave the 
head, (with razors made of obsidian,) and there are houses resembling our 
apothecary shops, where prepared medicines, unguents, and plasters are 
sold. The market abounds with so many things, that I am unable to name 
them all to your highness. To avoid confusion, every species of mer- 
chandise is sold in a separate lane. Every thing is sold by the yard, (by 
measure) but nothing has hitherto been seen to be weighed in the market. 
In the midst of the great square, is a house, which I shall call Vaudencia 
in which ten or twelve persons sit constantly for determining any disputes 
which may arise respecting the sale of goods. There are other persons 
who mix continually with the crowd, to see that a just price is asked 
We have seen them break the false measures, which they had seized frorr 
the merchants." 

Solis has recorded some facts, which are too interesting to mechanics to 
be omitted. " There were rows of silversmiths, who sold jewels and 
chains of extraordinary fashion ; a several figures of beasts in gold and 
silver, wrought with so much art, as raised the wonder of our artificers ; 
particularly some skillets with moving handles, that tvere so cast; besides 
other works of the same kind, with mouldings and relievos, without any 
signs of a hammer or graver." Herrera, speaking of these, observes, 
" some things were cast, and others wrought with stones, to such perfec- 
tion, that many of them have surprised the ablest goldsmiths in Spain, for 
they could never conceive how they had been made ; there being no sign 
of a hammer, or an engraver, or any other instrument used by them." 
They brought to the fair, (continues Solis) all the different sorts of cloth, 
made throughout this vast empire, of cotton and rabbits' fur, which the 
women of this country, enemies to idleness, spun extremely fine, being very 
dexterous in this manufacture. They had also drinking cups exquisitely 
made of the finest earth, different in color, and even in smell ; and of this 
kind, they had all sorts of vessels, necessary either for the service and or- 
nament of a house. 

a These, which were worn round the neck, were doubtless similar to those known as 
Panama chains ; which certainly are extraordinary specimens of workmanship. They 
may sometimes be met with at our jewellers, who buy them for the purity of the gold. 
It is said that the mode of making them has never been discovered, and that the 
secret is still preserved among the Indians of Panama. We have examined one which 
came from Carthagena, the length of which, had it been cut, was eight feet two inches ; 
its section, which was hexagonal, did not exceed one twentieth of an inch in diameter. 
It was formed of one or more fine wires, which seemed to have been woven or interlaced 
like the platting of a whip handle. When a single thread was examined by a micro- 
scope, it was found to be composed of several smaller wires, which separate, were scarce- 
ly perceptible to our unaided vision. The weight of the chain was eleven penny- 
weights, and it appeared to be as flexible as a piece of twine, certainly far more so 
than any chain formed of links. No end of a wire could be detected, and not a particle 
of solder was used. 



Chap. 18.] Ancient Aqueducts. 163 

No one can doubt, that a people, thus far advanced in civilization 
and the useful arts, were in possession of machines of some kind or 
other for raising water. Indeed the location and great population of 
some of their cities required a familiar knowledge of hydraulic <opera- 
tions to supply them with water; and hence it would seem as if they had 
cultivated this department of the arts equally with others, for some of 
their aqueducts would have done honor to Greece and Rome. Nearly all 
the ancient cities of Mexico were supplied by them. We have already 
remarked that Tlascala was furnished with abundance of baths and foun- 
tains — that every house in Zempoala had water — that Tezcuco had 
an aqueduct, from which every dwelling was supplied by a pipe, as 
in modern cities; and we may add, Iztaclapa, which contained about ten 
thousand houses, had its aqueduct that conveyed water from the neighbor- 
ing mountains, and led it through a great number of well cultivated gar- 
dens. In the city of Mexico, there were several aqueducts. That of Cha- 
pultepec was the work of Motezuma, and also the vast stone reservoir 
connected with it. When the Spaniards besieged the city they destroyed 
this aqueduct. Cortez in his first letter to Charles V. mentions the spring 
of Amilco, near Churubusco, of which the waters were conveyed to the 
city " in two large pipes, well moulded and as hard as stone, but the wa- 
ter never ran in more than one of them at the same time." We still per- 
ceive, says Humboldt, the remains of this great aqueduct, which was con- 
structed with double pipes, one of which received the water, while they 
were employed in cleansing the other ; but this aqueduct, he says, was in- 
ferior to the one at Tezcuco : of it, he observes, " we still admire the 
traces of a great mound, which was constructed to heighten the level of 
the water." The gardens of Motezuma were also adorned and nourish- 
ed with streams and. fountains, and appear to have rivalled those of Asiatic 
monarchs in splendor. And among the hieroglyphical ornaments of the 
pyramid of Xochicalco, are heads of crocodiles spouting water, a proof 
that ancient Americans were acquainted with that property of liquids 
by which they find their level ; and applied it not merely to fountains 
andjete aVeatc, but to convey water through pipes to their dwellings. 

We cannot reflect on the progress which the ancient inhabitants of 
Mexico had made in the arts, and the magnitude and excellence of some 
of their hydraulic works, without regretting that no particular accounts of 
their devices for raising water have been preserved. Of one thing how- 
ever, we may be sure, that no people ever constructed such works as they 
did, for the irrigation of land, and the supply of cities, who had not pre- 
viously experienced the inefficiency of machines for those purposes ; nor 
could their agriculture have been carried to the extent it was, without the 
aid of them in times of drought. 

' The machines called norias (says Humboldt) are essential to Mexican 
agriculture. ' a Does it not follow then that these, or others for the same 
purpose, were equally essential, before the conquest, when the population 
of the country was so much greater, and agriculture more extensively 
practised 1 There is no doubt, he observes, that all the country from the 
river Papaloapan " was better inhabited and better cultivated than it now 
is." The swape (guimbelette) is quite common in Mexico. Tt is there 
used as in this country for raising water from wells of moderate depth. A 
friend just returned from a tour in Texas, informs us, that among the 
Cooshattie tribe of Indians on the Trinity river, and in all the settlements, 
whether Indian, Creole, or modern Mexican ; in populous villages or at 

a New Spain, translated by Black, Vol. ii. 458. 



164 Palenque. [Book 1 

solitary wigwams, the ' well pole' or swape is almost always to be seen. 
In wells of considerable depth, the pulley and double chain with two 
buckets are adopted ; and. the chain of pots and noria are extensively used 
in raising water for irrigation, being moved, as in Spain, by oxen or mules. 
As these are the only devices for raising water that are now in use, ex- 
cept the common pump to a very limited extent, and the ordinary mode 
of drawing it from mines, by buckets worked by animals, the question oc- 
curs, were they or any of them in use previous to the conquest 1 The 
pump excepted, we should suppose they were ; but as before remarked, 
we have no direct evidence to establish the fact. As the Mexicans were 
collected in villages and accustomed to cultivate the soil, at least 400 years 
before the conquest, and subsequent to that event, the great mass of the 
farmers have been and are Indians, "who adhere with " extraordinary ob- 
stinacy" to the customs of their ancestors, it seems natural to suppose that 
they (like the agricultural classes of all other countries) would retain some 
of the old modes of raising water ; but as those above named are said to be 
the only ones practised, it is probable that some of them at least were 
known to the inhabitants of old. 

Palenque is about thirty miles from Tobasco. It is surrounded by 
dense forests, and overgrown with the vegetation of past ages. Of its 
founders and inhabitants nothing is known, nor yet of the period when 
they flourished. The remains of this city have been traced over an ex- 
tent of Uventy-four miles, and consist of massive edifices, of a novel and 
very chaste style of architecture. These are accurately laid out to the 
four cardinal points of the compass, and are built of hewn stone. There 
are temples, palaces, and tombs ornamented with the richest sculptures 
and bas reliefs, extensive excavations, subterranean passages, bridges, 
dikes, aqueducts, &c. all indicative of a powerful and highly civilized 
people. Dupaix and his companions, who were sent out in 1805 by 
Charles IV. of Spain, to examine and report on these buildings, after 
three weeks intense labor in cutting down trees which grew over them, 
were enabled to examine fifteen edifices, which elicited their wonder and 
admiration. Mr. Waldeck, a late traveler, who has spent several years 
in examining and collecting evidences of early American civilization, cut 
down a tree, (that was growing over an ancient building at Palenque) the 
concentric circles in a section of which, indicated a growth of 973 years ! 
But how many centuries had elapsed from the ruin and desertion of the 
city, and for the accumulation of soil over it, ere this tree took root, can 
only be conjectured. The sculptures on the walls are surprisingly per- 
fect, and among them are hieroglyphics which are supposed to have pho- 
netic power. Men and women are represented clothed in figured gar- 
ments, indicating the manufacture of flowered stuffs ; and various relics 
which have been disinterred, as toys, vessels, ornaments of dress, &c. 
prove considerable progress in other branches of the useful arts. But ex- 
tensive as these ruins are, and pregnant with information of thrilling in- 
terest, Palenque is like Mitla, the partner of its glory and of its degrada- 
tion, a ' city of the dead.' Not a voice is heard in it, or around it, but the 
hissing of serpents, the buzzing of insects, the gibbering of monkeys, and 
the screeching of wild birds. 

There is one circumstance respecting the ancient cities and people of 
Yucatan which relates to our subject, that is deserving of attention. It is 
this — from the geographical position and physical features of the country, 
wells have always been of primary importance. During the greater 
part of the year the inhabitants have no other resource for fresh water; 
and this must necessarily have been the case, ever since the present or- 



Chap. 18.J Ancient works of the Peruvians. 165 

ganization of these continents took place. In those remote ages, then, 
during which the country was occupied by a numerous and civilized peo- 
ple, wells must have been very common ; and as they are not, like struc- 
tures erected on the surface, subject to decay, or obnoxious to destruction, 
the discovery and examination of some of them is greatly to be desired. 
Who can tell what stores of treasure are buried in them ; what specimens of 
art ; what means for tracing the history, and also the revolutions, through 
which the ancient people of America have passed ; their origin, progress, 
and disappearance 1 If Palenque and its sister cities were destroyed by 
war, then it is almost certain that the inhabitants would have recourse to 
wells for the secretion of their treasures, both public and private ; a prac- 
tice that has been followed in all ages and by all people. 

Relics of former ages, which have been found (more or less numerous) 
over both continents, incontestibly prove that civilized people flourished 
here in former ages ; and that they and their progeny have disappeared, 
as if by some general and sudden calamity they had been swept off the 
stage of life, to a man. It would seem too, as if a long period of deathlike 
stillness had succeeded, (like that after the deluge) so that all knowledge 
of them had perished, when another race appeared and took possession 
of the soil. These were the ancestors of the present Indians, who, in 
their turn are rapidly becoming extinct, without our being able to tell who 
they were, whence they came, or when they first made their appearance. 
We see no reason to doubt their tradition respecting the great Megalonyx 
and Mastodon of the western prairies, having been contemporary with their 
forefathers, since the discovery of the bones of these animals corroborate in 
some degree the truth of it. Nor is it at all improbable that their ac- 
counts of the voracious and enormous Piasd, ■ the bird that devours men,' 
is fabulous ; a figure of which is cut on the face of a smooth and perpen- 
dicular rock, at an elevation which no human art can now reach ; near the 
mouth of a small stream, named the Piasa, which enters the Mississippi 
between Alton and the mouth of the Illinois. See Family Mag. 1837, 
Vol. iv, 101. 



ON THE HYDRAULIC AND OTHER WORKS OF THE ANCIENT PERUVIANS. 

Molina, in his ' Natural and civil History of Chili,'' observes that previous 
to the invasion of the Spaniards, the natives practised artificial irrigation, by 
conveying water from the higher grounds in canals to their fields. Herrera 
says, many of the vales were exceedingly populous and well cultivated, 
1 having trenches of water.' The Peruvians carried the system to a great 
extent. " How must we admire (says Humboldt) the industry and activity 
displayed by the ancient Mexicans and Peruvians in the irrigation of arid 
lands ! In the maritime parts of Peru, I have seen the remains of walls, 
along which water was conducted for a space of from 5 to 6000 metres, 
from the foot of the Codilleras to the coast. The conquerors of the 16th 
century destroyed these aqueducts, and that part of Peru has become, 
like Persia, a desart, destitute of vegetation. Such is the civilization car- 
ried by the Europeans among a people, whom they are pleased to call 
barbarous. " a These people had laws for the protection of water, very 
similar to those of Greece, Rome, Egypt, and all the older nations ; for 
those who conveyed water from the canals to their own land before their 
turn, were liable to arbitrary punishment. Several of the ancient Amer- 
ican customs respecting water, were identical with those of the oldest 

a New Spain, Black's Trans. Vol. ii, 46, and Frezier's Voyage to the South Seas, 213. 



166 Agriculture and Irrigation [Book 1, 

nations. They buried vessels of water with the dead. a The Mexicans 
worshipped it. b The Peruvians sacrificed to rivers and fountains. The 
Mexicans had Tlaloc their god of water. d Holy water was kept in their 
temples. e They practised divination by water.*" The Peruvians drew 
their drinking water from deep wells,? and for irrigation in times of 
drought, they drew it from pools, and lakes, and rivers. 

The annals of the world do not furnish brighter examples of national 
benevolence, than the early history of Peru. The wars of the incas 
were neither designed nor carried on, to gratify ambition or the lust of con- 
quest, but to extend to the brutalized people by whom they were sur- 
rounded, the advantages of civilized life ; to introduce agriculture and all 
its attending blessings, among hordes of savages, that were sunk in the 
lowest depths of bestiality. But that which sheds a peculiar glory over 
the ancient Peruvians, was their systematic and persevering efforts to 
achieve their conquests without the effusion of blood. In reading their 
history, the mind is not only relieved from those horrible details of car- 
nage that constitutes so prominent a part in the historic pages of other na- 
tions, but the most agreeable emotions are excited by the benevolent and 
generally successful endeavors of this people, to overcome their foes by 
reason — by exhibiting to them the advantages of regulated society, and by 
invitations to embrace them. This policy was in accordance with the in- 
junctions of their first king, whose precepts they greatly reverenced. He 
taught them to overcome their enemies " by love — by the force of bene- 
fits" and hence we find that when they were successful, they neither 
robbed the inhabitants of their land, their liberty, nor their lives but used 
their influence and superior knowledge to ameliorate their condition. And 
when these efforts failed, and active warfare was the only resource, they, 
conscious of the wickedness of conquering men by their destruction, 
and that those could never be good subjects who ' obeyed from fear,' 
uniformly besieged them, till the latter became convinced of their own ina- 
bility to resist, and of the policy of acceding to the terms of their pow- 
erful invaders. 

In this manner the ' children of the sun' extended their conquests over 
a large part of the southern continent ; and in no part of the world were 
provinces more loyal, or a people more attached to their institutions and 
to their princes ; nor was there ever a people more humane. The con- 
duct of some of the incas, when at the head of their armies, in endur- 
ing the taunts and scoffs of their ignorant and imbecile foes with philo- 
sophic forbearance, is truly admirable, and might be contrasted with that of 
christian warriors ; but then their object was not to acquire fame by the 
destruction of their species, but to benefit them, even at the risk of their 
reputation. If ever offensive wars were justifiable, those of the early 
incas certainly were, since their object was the extension of human hap- 
piness, and which they carried on in a corresponding spirit of humanity. 
In neither sacred nor profane history can such examples be found. 

Agriculture was the first object to which their attention was directed ; 
hence we find engineers and other artists immediately sent into the subdued 
countries, or rather, among their new friends, to introduce the arts of 
ploughing and cultivating the soil, &c. And as large tracts of land were 
destitute of vegetation for want of water, mention is constantly made of 
aqueducts and reservoirs among the earliest of works undertaken. In 
some districts, rain was, and still is, unknown. " For the space of seven 

» Purchas's Pilgrim. 1080. b Ibid. 966. c Ibid. 1070. d Ibid. 986. e Ibid. 987. f Ibid 
994. s Ibid. 1064. 



Chap. 18.] of the 'Peruvians. 167 

hundred leagues along the coast (says Garcilasso) it did never rain." 
Contrivances to obtain and distribute water, were therefore, with the in- 
cas as with the early kings of Egypt, the most important and constant ob- 
jects of their care. Nor does it appear that the Egyptians were more 
assiduous in this kind of labor than the people of Peru. Examples are 
mentioned of the latter having conveyed small streams through a space 
of sixty miles, to irrigate a few acres of land. 

There are several points of resemblance between these two people ; 
some of which are to be attributed to both countries being, in a great 
measure, destitute of rain. The first inca, like Osiris, taught the inhabi- 
tants to cultivate the land ; to construct reservoirs and aqueducts; to make 
ploughs, harrows, and shoes for their own feet — such shoes, says Garci- 
lasso, ' as they now wear.' The wife of Manco Capac, like Isis, taught 
the women to spin, to weave, and to make their own garments. Some 
of their fables, too, resemble those of the Egyptians respecting Isis. Ac- 
cording to one, " the maker of all things placed in heaven a virgin, the 
daughter of a king, holding a bucket of water in her hand, for the refresh- 
ment of the earth." Both people erected stupendous structures and sta- 
tues of cut and polished stone, which they wrought without iron ; both 
shaved the head, and both embalmed the dead. 

As we have no where met with any distinct notice of, or even allusion 
to, any Peruvian machine for raising water, we insert some notices of their 
wells and aqueducts, &c. from Garcilasso's " Royal Commentaries of 
Peru." The reader can then judge, whether a people who devised and 
constructed hydraulic works of immense magnitude for the distribution 
of water, were without some machines for raising it ; and especially, 
when, at certain seasons, they obtained it from deep wells. The inca 
Garcilasso de la Vega, was a native of Cusco. His mother was a Peru- 
vian princess ; but his father, whose name he bore, was one of the Spanish 
conquerors. He was born (he informs us) eight years after the Spaniards 
became masters of the country, i. e. in the year 1539, and was educated 
by his mother and her relatives, in the Indian manner, till he was twenty 
years old. In 1560 he was sent to Spain, where he wrote his Commen- 
taries. These were translated into English by Sir Paul Ricaut, and pub- 
lished in one volume, folio, London, 1688. 

There is reason to believe that Peru, Chili, and other parts of the 
southern continent, were inhabited by a refined, or partially refined peo- 
ple, centuries before the time of Manco Capac, the first inca; and that a 
long period of barbarism had intervened, induced, perhaps, by revolutions 
similar to those which, in the old world, swept all the once celebrated 
nations of antiquity into oblivion. The ancient Peruvians had a tradition 
respecting the arrival of giants, who located themselves on the coast, and 
who dug wells of immense depth through the solid rock ; which wells, 
as well as cisterns, still remain. When Mayta Capac, the fourth inca, 
reduced the province of Tiahuanacu, he found colossal pyramids and other 
structures, with gigantic statues, of whose authors or uses, says Garcilasso, 
" no man can conjecture." The ruins of these are still extant, in one of 
the districts of Buenos Ay res. In the same province, the writer just 
named mentions a monolithic temple, which, from the description, equals 
any of those of Egypt. These ancient buildings were supposed by the 
Peruvians to have furnished models for the Temple, Palace, and Fortress 
at Cusco, which the first incas erected. Acosta, in examining some of 
these buildings in Tiahuanacu, was at a loss to comprehend how they 
could have been erected; so large, well cut, and closely jointed were the 
stones. " I measured one myself, (he observes) which was thirty feet in 



168 Aqueducts [Book 1 

length, eighteen in breadth, and six feet in thickness ;" and in the For- 
tress of Cusco were stones, he says, muck larger. But what adds to our 
surprise, many of these stones were taken from quarries at from five to 
fifteen leagues distance from the buildings. 

There is much uncertainty respecting Manco Capac. Who he was, 
and from what country he came, are equally unknown. According to 
their Quippus or historical cords, and the opinion of the inca who was uncle 
to Garcilasso, and who communicated to the latter all the knowledge of 
their ancestors then extant, he made his appearance in Peru about 400 
years before the invasion of the Spaniards. It is said he was whiter than 
the natives, and was clothed in flowing garments. Awed by his presence, 
they received him as a divinity, became subject to his laws, and practised 
the arts he introduced. He founded Cusco, and extended his influence 
to all the nations around. He taught them agriculture and many useful 
arts, especially that of irrigating land. His son succeeded him, and with- 
out violence greatly extended the limits of the kingdom ; prevailing with 
the natives, it is said, by a peaceable and gentle manner, " to plough, and 
manure, and cultivate the soil." His successors pursued the same mode, 
and with the same success. The fifth inca, we are informed, constructed 
aqueducts, bridges and roads in all the countries he subdued. When the 
sixth inca acquired a new province, he ordered the lands to be " dressed 
and manured ;" the fens to be drained, " for in that art [draining] they 
were excellent, as is apparent by their works, which remain to this day : 
and also they were [then] very ingenious in making aqueducts for carrying 
water into dry and scorched lands, such as the greatest part of that coun- 
try is : they always made contrivances and inventions to bring their water. 
These aqueducts, though they were ruined after the Spaniards came in, 
yet several reliques and monuments of them remain unto this day." 

The seventh inca, Yiracocha, constructed some water works, which, in 
their beneficial effects, perhaps equalled any similar undertakings in any 
other part of the world. " He made an aqueduct 12 feet in depth, and 
120 leagues in length : the source or head of it arose from certain springs 
on the top of a high mountain between Parcu and Picuy, which was so 
plentiful that at the very head of the fountains they seemed to be rivers. 
This current of water had its course through all the country of the Ru- 
canas, and served to water the pasturage of those uninhabited lands, which 
are about 18 leagues in breadth, watering almost the whole country of 
Peru." 

" There is another aqueduct much like this, which traverses the whole 
province of Cuntisuyu, running above 150 leagues from south to north. 
Its head or original is from the top of high mountains, the which waters 
falling into the plains of the Quechuas, greatly refresh their pasturage, 
when the heats of the summer and autumn have dried up the moisture of 
the earth. There are many streams of like nature, which run through 
divers parts of the empire, which being conveyed by aqueducts, at the 
charge and expense of the incas, are works of grandeur and ostentation, 
and which recommend the magnificence of the incas to all posterity ; for 
these aqueducts may well be compared to the miraculous fabricks which 
have been the works of mighty princes, who have left their prodigious 
monuments of ostentation to be admired by future ages ; for, indeed, we 
ought to consider that these waters had their source and beginning from 
vast, high mountains, and were carried over craggy rocks and inaccessible 
passages ; and to make these ways plain, they had no help of instruments 
forged of steel or iron, such as pickaxes or sledges, but served themselves 
only with one stone to break another. Nor were they acquainted with 



CLap. 18.] in Ancient Peru. 169 

the invention of arches, to convey the water on the level from one preci 
pice to the other, but traced round the mountain until they found ways 
and passages at the same height and level with the head of the springs. 

" The cisterns or conservatories which they made for these waters, at 
the top of the mountain, were about twelve feet deep ; the passage was 
broken through the rocks, and channels made of hewn stone, of about two 
yards long and about a yard high ; which were cemented together, and 
rammed in with earth so hard, that no water. would pass between, to 
weaken or vent itself by the holes of the channel. 

" The current of water which passes through all the division of Cunti- 
suyu I have seen in the province of Quechua, which is part of that divis- 
ion, and considered it an extraordinary work, and indeed surpassing the 
description and report which hath been made of it. But the Spaniards 
who were aliens and strangers, little regarded the convenience of these 
works, either to serve themselves in the use of them, or keep them in re- 
pair, nor yet to take so much notice of them, as to mention them in their 
histories, but rather out of a scornful and disdaining humor, have suffered 
them to run into ruine, beyond all recovery. The same fate hath befallen 
the aqueducts which the Indians made for watering their corn lands, of 
which two thirds at least are wholly destroyed, and none kept in repair, 
unless some few which are so useful that without them they cannot sus- 
tain themselves with bread, nor with the necessary provisions of life. 
All which works are not so totally destroyed, but that there still remains 
some ruines and appearances of them.' , 

The last who was independent, and by far the worst of the incas, was 
Atahualpa or Atabalipa, the 13th from Manco Capac. He treacherously 
slew his brother and murdered nearly all his relations. Garcilasso's 
mother and a few others escaped. He was strangled by Pizarro in May 
1533, after having purchased his life of that monster, by filling the room ot 
his prison with gold and silver vessels, and ingots, to a line chalked round 
the wall, at the height of about seven feet from the ground. This room 
was twenty-five feet by sixteen. 

That the Peruvians had wells in the remotest times has already been no- 
ticed ; and when the Spaniards invaded their country, great quantities 
of treasures were thrown into them. The discovery of these wells 
may yet bring to view numerous specimens of their works in the 
metals. We have not met with any intimation of their manner of raising 
water, whether by a simple cord and vessel, by means of a pulley, or 
a windlass, or any other machine. 'Tis true that Garcilasso, when describ- 
ing the various pendants which they wore in their ears, mentions rings 
as large " as the frame of a pulley, for they were made in the form of 
those with which we draw up pitchers from a well, and of that compass, that 
in case it were beaten straight, it would be a quarter of a yard long and 
a finger in thickness," but in this passage we understand him to refer to 
the Spanish method of drawing water ; and this is probable, for in anoth- 
er part of his work, when speaking of the large stones used in the public 
buildings at Cusco, he says the workmen had neither cranes nor pulleys. 
Still it is possible that he referred to the mode his countrymen employed. 

There are conclusive proofs however, in some extracts that are too in- 
teresting to be omitted, that the ancient Peruvians were well acquainted 
with the management and distribution of water through pipes ; and of 
making and laying the latter ; and what is singular, both the sources of 
the water and the direction of the tubes under ground were kept secret, 
as was the custom with some people of Asia. " In many of the houses 
'of the incas) were great cisterns of gold, in which thev bathed themselves, 

22 



170 Casterns and Pipes in Cusco. [Book I 

with cocks and pipes of the same metal, for conveyance of the water." 
Some interesting particulars are also given by Garcilasso respecting the 
supply of Cusco with water. Speaking of a certain street, he says, " near 
thereunto are two pipes of excellent water, which pass under ground, but 
by whom they were laid and brought thither, is unknown, for want of 
writings or records to transmit the memory of them to posterity. Those 
pipes of water are called silver snakes, because the whiteness oi the wa- 
ter resembled silver ; and the windings or the meanders of the pipes were 
like the coils and turnings of serpents." In the fortress of Cusco was "a 
fountain of excellent water, which was brought at a far distance under 
ground, but where and from whence the Indians do not know ; for such 
secrets as these were always reserved from common knowledge in the 
breasts of the inca and of his counsel." The lake Cliinchiru near Cusco, 
contained good water, and "by the munificence of the inca was fur- 
nished with several pipes and aqueducts," to convey water into lower 
grounds, which were used till rendered useless by neglect of the Span- 
iards. " Afterwards, in the year 1555 and 56, they were repaired by my 
lord and father Garcilasso de la Vega, he being the mayor of that city, and 
in that condition I left them." 

In describing the temple and gardens at Cusco, he observes, " there 
/ were five fountains of water, which ran from divers places through pipes 
of gold. The cisterns were some of stone, and others of gold and silver, 
in which they washed their sacrifices, as the solemnity of the festival ap- 
pointed. In my time there was but one of these fountains remaining, 
which served the garden of a convent with water ; the others were lost, 
either for want of drawing or cleansing, and this is very probable, be- 
cause, to my knowledge, that which belonged to the convent was lost for 
six or seven months, for want of which water the whole garden was dried 
up and withered, to the great lamentation of the convent and the whole 
city ; nor could any Indian understand how that water came to fail, or to 
what place it took its course. At length they came to find that on the 
west side of the convent the water took its course under ground, and 
fell into the brook which passes through the city ; which in the times of 
the incas had its banks kept up with stones, and the bottom well paved, 
that the earth might not fall in; the which work was continued through 
the whole city, and for a quarter of a league without ; which now by the 
carelessness and sloth of the Spaniards is broken, and the pavement dis- 
placed ; for though the spring commonly yields not water very plentiful- 
ly, yet sometimes it rises on a sudden and makes such an incredible inun- 
dation that the force of the current hath disordered the channel and the 
bottoms." 

" In the year 1558 there happened a great eruption of water from this 
fountain, which broke the main pipe and the channel, so that the fury of 
the torrent took another course and left the garden dry ; and now by that 
abundance of rubbish and sullage which comes from the city, the channel 
is filled up, and not so much as any mark or signal thereof remains. The 
friars, though at length they used all the diligence imaginable, yet they 
could not find the ancient channel, and to trace it from the fountain head 
by way of the pipes, it was an immense work, for they were to dig 
through houses and deep conveyances under ground, to come at it, for the 
head of the spring was high. Nor could any Indian be found that could 
give any direction herein, which discouraged them in their work, and in 
the recovery of the others which anciently belonged to the temple. 
Hence we may observe the ignorance and inadvertisement of those In- 
dians, and how little the benefit of tradition availed amongst them ; for 



Chap. IS.] Peruvian works in Metals. 171 

though it be only forty-two years at this day since those waters forsook 
their course ; yet neither the loss of so necessary a provision as water, 
which was the refreshment of their lives, nor of that stream which sup- 
plied the temple of the sun, their god, could by nature or religion con- 
serve in them the memory of so remarkable a particular. The' truth is, 
that it is probable that the undertakers or master- workmen of those water 
works did communicate or make known to the priests only, the secret con- 
veyances of those waters ; esteeming every thing which belonged to the 
honor and service of the temple to be sacred, that it was not to be re- 
vealed to common ears, and for this reason perhaps the knowledge of those 
waters might dye and end with the order of priests." 

" At the end of six or seven months after it was lost, it happened that 
some Indian boys playing about the stream, discovered an eruption of wa- 
ter from the broken pipe ; of which they acquainting one the other, at 
length it came to the knowledge of the Spaniards, who, judging it to be 
the water of the convent that had been lost and diverted from its former 
course, gave information thereof unto the friars, who joyfully received 
the good news, and immediately labored to bring it again into direct 
conveyance, and conduct it to their garden. The truth is, the pipes lying 
very deep were buried with earth, so that it cost much labor and pains to 
to reduce it to its right channel ; and yet they were not so curious or in- 
dustrious as to trace the fountain to the spring head. That garden which 
now supplies the convent with herbs and plants, was the garden which in 
the times of the incas belonged to their palace, called the garden of gold 
and silver ; because, that in it were herbs and flowers of all sorts, lower 
plants and shrubs, and taller trees, made all of gold and silver ; together 
with all sorts of wild beasts and tame, which were accounted rare and 
unusual. There were also strange insects, and creeping things, as snakes, 
serpents, lizards, camelions, butterflies, and snails ; also all sorts of strange 
birds, and every thing disposed, and in its proper place with great care, 
and imitated with much curiosity, like the nature and original of that it 
represented. There was also a mayzal], which bears the Indian wheat of 
an extraordinary bigness, the seed whereof they call quinia. Likewise 
plants which produce lesser seeds, and trees bearing their several sorts of 
fruit, all made of gold and silver, and excellently representing them in 
their natural shapes. In the palace also, they had heaps or piles of billets 
and faggots made of gold and silver, rarely well counterfeited. And for 
the greater adornment and majesty of the temple of their god the sun, 
they had cast vast figures in the forms of men and icomen and children, 
which they laid up in magazines or large chambers, called pirra ; and 
every year, at the principal feasts, the people presented great quantities 
of gold and silver, which were all employed in the adornment of the tem- 
ple. And those goldsmiths whose art and labor was dedicated to the sun, 
attended to no other work, than daily to make new inventions of rare work- 
manship out of those metals. In short they made all sorts of vessels or 
utensils belonging to the temple, of gold and silver, such as pots, and pans, 
wad pails, B.ndfre slwvels, and tongs, and every thing else of use and ser- 
vice, even their very spades and rakes of the garden were made of the 
like metal." 3 - 

The author of ' Italy, with sketches of Spain and Portugal,' Phil. 
1834, enumerating some of the curiosities in the museum of Madrid, re- 

a The mission of Messrs. James. Bowdich and Hutchinson, sent by the British go 
vernment to Ashantee, found the king and all his attendants literally oppressed with em 
bellishments of solid gold, with which their persons were nearly covered. • Even tha 
most common utensils were composed of that metal.' 



J 72 Original Inhabitants of Peru. [Book 1 

marks : " what pleased me most, was a collection of Peruvian vases ; a 
polished stone which served the incas for a mirror ; and a linen mantle, 
which formerly adorned their copper colored shoulders, as finely woven 
as a shawl, and flowered in very nearly a similar manner ; the colors as 
fresh and vivid as if new." Vol. ii, 211. 

It is difficult after perusing the history of this interesting people, to re- 
concile the state of the arts among them at the Spanish invasion, with the 
opinion, that Manco Capac arrived from Asia at so late a period as the 
12th century. If he was the enterprising and intelligent man that he is 
represented to have been, and there is every reason to believe he was, it 
is impossible that as an Asiatic, he could have been ignorant of the saw, 
the auger, files, of fitting wooden handles to hammers, of nails, scissors, 
the crane, windlass, pulley, the arch, iron, &c : or having a knowledge of 
these things, that he should not have introduced them, or at least some of 
them. But if the Peruvians were also ignorant of the swape, noria, 
or chain of pots, the objections to such an opinion are greatly strengthen- 
ed. From what part of the eastern world could such a man have come 
without having a knowledge of these machines, and yet be acquainted, as 
he was, with all the essential features of oriental agriculture 1 Machines 
too, of the utmost importance in Peru, where rain was generally unknown, 
and water scarce and valuable as in Egypt itself — and machines more 
necessary than any other, in furthering the objects he had in view 
While a doubt remains respecting their employment, we should sup 
pose that he really was, as surmised by Grarcilasso, a native, who by 
the superiority of his understanding, and by a subtile deportment (the more 
effectually to carry out his measures) persuaded the people that he came 
from the sun. Indeed, the state of the useful arts generally among them 
in the 15th century, implies that they had not had any permanent connec- 
tion with Asiatics for many ages ; but that they were gradually recovering 
a knowledge of the arts, which in very remote times had been practised 
by nations then extinct ; and hence the paucity of their tools and the 
peculiarity of some of their devices, as their quippus or historical cords, 
their modes of computation, &c. Moreover, neither the Mexicans nor 
Peruvians had reduced the lower animals to subjection, at any rate not 
for agricultural purposes ; and though they had neither the horse, the ass, 
nor ox ; yet the former had the buffalo, an animal that has been used 
from the remotest ages to plough the soil. This circumstance alone is 
sufficient to show that they did not derive their knowledge of agriculture 
from Asia, within the time generally supposed, if at all. 

Who can reflect on the civilized people, that in remote ages inhabited 
these continents, without mourning over their extinction, and the loss of 
every record respecting them 1 A people, whose very existence would 
have been unknown, had not some relics of their labors (like the organic 
remains of animals whose species are extinct) yet resisted the corroding 
effects of time. When we examine the ruins of their temples, their cities, 
and other monuments of their progress in the arts, our disappointment 
amounts to distress, that the veil which conceals them, is not, and perhaps 
cannot be removed. Strange as it may appear, we are almost as ignorant 
of the mysterious Palenque, and hundreds of other cities, equally and 
some of them perhaps much more ancient — as of the builders of Babel— 
and we know about as little of their early inhabitants as if they had been 
located on another planet. 

END OF THE FIRST BOOK. 



BOOK II. 



MACHINES FOR RAISING WATER BY THE PRESSURE OF THE 

ATMOSPHERE. 



CHAPTER I. 

ON machines that raise water by atmospheric pressure — Principle of their action formerly unknown- 
Suction a chimera — Ascent of water in pumps incomprehensible without a knowledge of atmospheric 
pressure — Phenomena in the organization, habits, and motions of animals — Rotation of the atmosphere 
with the earth — Air tangible — Compressible — Expansible — Elastic — Air beds — Ancient beds and bed- 
steads — Weight of air — Its pressure — Examples — American Indians and the air pump — Boa Constrictor 
— Swallowing oysters — Shooting bullets by the rarefaction of air — Boy's sucker — Suspension of flie3 
against gravity — Lizards — Frogs — Walrus — Connection between all departments of knowledge — Suck 
ing fish — Remora — Lampreys — Dampier — Christopher Columbus at St. Domingo— Ferdinand Columbus 
— Ancient fable — Sudden expansion of' air bursting the bladders of fish — Pressure of the atmosphere on 
liquids. 

With the last chapter we concluded our remarks on machines em- 
braced in the first general division of the subject, (see page 8) and now 
proceed to those of the second ; viz. such as raise water by means of the 
weight or pressure of the atmosphere. These form a very interesting 
class — they are genuine philosophical instruments, and as such may serve 
to exhibit and illustrate some of the most important truths of natural phi- 
losophy. The principle upon which their action depends was formerly un- 
known, and even now, a person, however ingenious, while ignorant of the 
nature and properties of the atmosphere, would be utterly unable to ac- 
count for the ascent of water in them. Having no idea of the cause of 
this ascent, except the vague one of suction, he would feel greatly embar- 
rassed if required to explain it. And when informed that there really is 
no such thing in nature as suction, but that it is a mere chimera, having no 
existence except in the imagination, the task would be attended with in- 
superable difficulties. Perhaps he would have recourse to a common 
pump, to trace, if possible, the operation in detail; if so, he would natural- 
ly begin with the first mover, or the pump handle, and would look for 
some medium, by which motion is transmitted from it, to the water in the 
well ; but, however close the scrutiny might be made, he would be una- 
ble to detect any ; and as a matter of course, while a connection between 
them, i. e. between the mover and the object moved, could not be discov- 
ered, it would be impossible for him satisfactorily to account for the phe- 
nomenon. If " a body cannot act where it is not present," as the sucker 
of a pump, on water at a distance from it, how could such a person ac- 
count for the ascent of that water in obedience to the movements of the 
sucker? And how could he explain the process by which it was effected,. 



174 Ascent of "Water in Pumps incomprehensible [Book II, 

while lie could find no apparent communication between them ? The fact is 
it would be difficult for him to point out any closer connection between 
the pump rod and the water in the well, than between a walking cane in 
the hands of a pedestrian, and water under the surface of the ground 
over which he stepped ; nor could he assign a conclusive reason, why the 
liquid should not ascend and accompany the movements of the latter as 
well as of the former. 

He could perceive no obvious or adequate cause for the elevation of 
water through the pipe of a pump, there being no apparent force applied 
to it, or in the direction of its ascent, no vessel or moveable pallet going 
down, as in the preceding machines, to convey or urge the liquid up — and 
hence he could no more comprehend how the movements of a pump box 
(sucker) above the surface of the ground, should induce water in a well 
to rush up towards it, than he could explain how the waving of a magi- 
cian's wand should cause spirits to appear. 

Long familiarity with the atmospheric pump, makes it hard for us, at the 
present day, to realize the difficulties formerly experienced in accounting 
for the ascent of water in it. Suppose the cause yet unknown and un- 
thought of — it certainly would puzzle us to explain how a piece of leath- 
er (the sucker) moving up and down in a vertical tube, whose lower ori- 
fice is in water, some twenty-five or thirty feet below it, should conjure 
that water up. Such a result is opposed to all experience and observa- 
tion in other departments of the arts ; nor is there any thing like it, in the 
machines we have examined in the preceding book. The mechanism by 
which motion is transmitted from them to the water, is obvious to the 
senses — a tangible medium of communication is established between the 
force that works them and the water they raise ; whereas in the pump, an 
invisible agent is excited, whose effects are as surprising as its mode of 
operation is obscure. 'Tis true, a tube (the pump pipe) is continued from 
the place where the sucker moves to the water, but it remains at rest, or 
is immoveable, and therefore cannot transmit motion from one to the other; 
it is merely a channel through which the water may rise — it does not 
raise it. 

But if, in order to establish a connection between the sucker and water, 
the former were made to descend through the pump into the latter, still 
the difficulty would not be overcome. The sucker in that case would act 
much like one of those buckets, used in some wells, which has an opening 
in its bottom to admit the water, and covered by a flap to prevent its 
return. (The sucker is in fact, merely a small bucket of this kind, and is 
so named in some countries.) In both cases the water would be raised 
which entered through the valves — the bucket would bring up all it con- 
tained, and the sucker all that passed through it into the pump ; so far the 
operation of both is clear, and as regards the raising of the water above 
the valves, would be the same ; but it is the ascent of a column of water 
behind the sucker that requires explanation — a liquid column that follows 
it as closely through every turn of the tube, as if it were a rope, having 
its fibres at one end fastened to the sucker and fulled up by it. What 

is it that makes this water ascend against a law of its nature — against 
gravity 1 Were the cohesion of its particles such that it could be raised 
by a force applied only to its upper end, then indeed the difficulty would be 
diminished ; but in that case, it would follow that a similar column would 
ascend after a bucket when drawn out of an open well ; and further, that 
a traveler might then make use of a liquid walking stick, to assist him in 
his journeying. 

Baffled thus in our attempts to find a solution here, we perhaps would 



Chap. 1.] Without a knowledge of Atmospheric Pressure. 175 

be^in to think, that when a liquid is raised in the pipe of a pump, it must 
be b^- some force acting below, or behind it, a force a tergo, as it is named, 
and of which all the preceding- machines are examples. Thu? when a 
bucket of water is raised from a well, the force is applied oehind it, 
i. e. to the bottom of the bucket, through the cord, bale, and sides, to which 
it is attached. It is the same in the screw, the force continually elevating 
a portion of it immediately behind the water ; and in the tympanum, no- 
ria, chain of pots, chain pump, &c. it is the same ; the vessels or pallets 
go below, i. e. behind the liquid and urge it up before them. It is the same 
in all ordinary motions. I wish to examine a small object laying at the 
foot of my garden : now I cannot by moving this ruler in its direction, in 
the manner of a pump rod, induce it to move to me, nor can it ever be so 
moved, until the force of some other body in motion behind it impel it to- 
wards me. It is the same in the case of a stubborn boy, who not only re- 
fuses to move as directed, but opposes the natural inertia of his body to 
the change, and therefore can only be impelled forward by gome force ap- 
plied directly or indirectly behind him, by dragging or pushing him along. 
In this way, all the motions in the universe, according to some philoso- 
phers, are imparted or transferred; those which appear exceptions being 
considered modifications of it. Still however, the difficulty of establishing 
a connection between the movements of the sucker in the interior of the 
pump at one end, and this force, whatever it might be, acting on the wa- 
ter, outride of it, at the opposite end, would remain ; and we should prob- 
ably at last impute this ascent of water (with the ancients) to some inde- 
finable energy of nature, both fallacious and absurd ; nor would this be 
surprising, for in the absence of a knowledge of the atmosphere and of 
its properties, there really is as great a mystery in the movements of a 
pump rod being followed by the ascent of the liquid, as in any thing ever 
attributed to the divining rod, or to the wand of Abaris. 

In order to understand the operation of machines belonging to this part 
of the subject, and also the principle upon which their action depends, we 
must leave, for a few moments, the consideration of pumps and pipes, and all 
the contrivances of man, and turn our attention to some of the Creator's works 
as they are exhibited in nature. This may perhaps be deemed a depar- 
ture from the subject ; it is however so far from being a digression, that it 
is essentially necessary to ascertain the cause of water ascending in this 
class of machines, as well as to understand the philosophy of numerous 
natural as well as artificial operations, that are performed by apparatus 
analogous to them : as the acts of inspiration and respiration, quadrupeds 
drinkinsr, the youno - of animals sucking: their dams, children drawing nour- 
ishment from their mothers' breasts : bleeding by cupping, by leeches, 
or by the more delicate apparatus of a musketoe's proboscis ; and if 
things ignoble may be named, the taking of snuff, smoking of cigars and 
pipes of tobacco, and also the experiments of those peripatetic philosophers, 
who perambulate our wharves, and imbibe nectar through straws from 
hogsheads of rum and molasses. 

Every person is aware, that the earth on which we live is of a globular 
or spheroidal figure, and that it is enveloped in an invisible ocean of air or 
gas, which extends for a great number of miles from every part of its sur- 
face. This hollow sphere of air is named the atmosphere, and is one of 
the most essential parts in the economy of nature. It is the source as 
well as the theatre of those sublime meteorological phenomena which we 
constantly behold and admire. It is necessary to animal and to vegetable 
life. Its material is the ' breath of life' to all things living. It is more- 
over the peculiar element of land animals, the scene of their actions, the 



176 Compressibility and Dilatability of Air. [Book II. 

fluid ocean in which they only can move, and within which they are al- 
ways immersed. It is to them, what the sea is to fish : remove them from 
it, and they necessarily die. In some respects nature has been more fa- 
vorable to fishes than to us : most of them can ascend to the surface of 
the fluid in which they live, but we can only exist in the lowest depths of 
the atmospheric ocean that confines us : if we ascend but a little, our 
energies begin to fail, and we are compelled to descend to the bottom, the 
place she designed us to occupy. 

Possibly, some people may suppose that the velocity with which the 
earth shoots forward in her orbit, might sometimes cause this atmosphere 
(which hangs as a mantle so loosely about her) to be left floating, like the 
tail of a comet, behind ; or be entirely separated from her, like the cloud of 
vapor which the impetuous ball leaves at the cannon's mouth. Such how- 
ever is not the fact ; on the contrary, it revolves uniformly with the earth 
on the axis of the latter, and accompanies her, as a part of herself, round 
the sun. Were it indeed separated from her, but for a moment, either by 
an increase or diminution of her velocity, the present organization of na- 
ture would be destroyed ; every mountain would be hurled from its base ; 
every house on the globe would be leveled ; and no human being could 
survive. Had the atmosphere not a rotatory motion also, in common 
with that of the earth, i. e. of the same velocity and in the same direction, 
a very different state of things, as regards the arts, would have subsisted 
than those which we behold. For example, aerial navigation would cer- 
tainly have superseded nearly all traveling by land and water ; and rail- 
roads, and locomotive carriages, and steamboats, would hardly have been 
known ; for the project of that individual who proposed to visit distant 
countries, by merely ascending in a balloon, till the rotation of the earth 
on its axis brought them under him, when he intended to descend, would 
have been no visionary scheme. 

The air is tangible. — Although the substance of the atmosphere is not 
visible, it is tangible ; we feel it when in motion as wind, whether it be 
gently disturbed as in the evening breeze, or by the slight waving of a 
lady's fan; or when greatly excited, as in the hurricane, or the violent blast 
from a bellows' mouth. We also see its effects when thus in motion, in 
the direction of smoke, extinction of our tapers, slamming of doors, in the 
beautiful waving of grass, and of the full eared grain of the fields ; trees 
yielding to its impulse, buildings unroofed, and sometimes in the prostra- 
tion of large tracts of forests ; in windmills, sailing of ships, and the con- 
vulsions into which it throws the otherwise placid ocean. 

Air is compressible. — Indeed compressibility and expansibility are pro- 
perties of all bodies ; by the abstraction of heat, airs are compressed into 
liquids, and liquids into solids, while an increase of temperature expands 
solids into liquids, and these into airs. In the common air gun, four or five 
gallons of the dense air around us are compressed into a pint, and by 
further pressure they may be squeezed into a few drops of liquid, which 
a tea spoon might contain. 

Its expansibility or dilatability is, so far as known, illimitable ; the space 
it occupies being always in proportion to the pressure that confines it. If 
a collapsed and apparently empty bladder be placed under a receiver, 
and the air around its exterior be removed, the small portion within will 
expand and swell it out to its natural shape. If it were possible to with- 
draw the whole. of the air from this room, and a globule no larger than a pea 
were then admitted, it would instantly dilate and fill the room. The upper 
strata of the atmosphere decrease in density as they recede from the 
earth's surface, on account of the diminution of the pressure from super- 



Chap. 1.J 



Air Beds. 



177 



incumbent strata, and thus at a certain height this small globule of air 
would occupy a space equal to the earth itself! And at the height of four 
or five hundred miles, it has been calculated, that less than a teacup full 
of the air we breathe, would fill a sphere equal in diameter to the very 
orhit of Saturn ! The efficiency of the air pump in producing a vacuum 
depends entirely on this property. 

Air at the foot of a mountain, whose elevation is between three and 
four miles, occupies twice the space when carried to the top. A quart of 
it taken from the summit would be reduced to a pint if conveyed to the 
bottom. From this expansive power of air arises its elasticity. This is 
familiar to most people ; for when confined in flexible vessels, as air beds, 
pillows, life preservers, &c. as soon as any weight or pressure imping- 
ing upon them is removed, the elasticity of the confined fluid pushes up 
the depressed part as before. If air within a bladder were not elastic, the 
impressions made by the fingers in handling it would remain as in a ball 
of paste, and air beds would retain the form of bodies that reposed upon 
them, like a founder's mould of sand or plaster* Those extremely light 

a Air beds are not, as some persons suppose, of modern origin. They were known 
between three and four hundred years ago, as appears from the annexed cut, (No. 68,) 
copied from some figures attached to the first German translation of Vegetius, A. D. 
1511. It represents soldiers reposing on them in time of war, with the mode of infla- 
ting them by bellows. 




No. 68. Ancient Air Bed. 

This application of air was probably known to the Romans. Heliogabalus used to 
amuse himself with the guests he invited to his banquets, by seating them on large bags 
or beds, " full of wind," which being made suddenly to collapse, threw the guests on the 
ground. 

Dr. Arnott, the author of * Elements of Physics,' a few years ago, proposed ' Hydro- 
static beds,' especially for invalids. These are capacious bags, formed of india-rubber 
cloth, and filled with water instead of feathers, hr.ir, &c. Upon one of these a soft and thin 
mattress is laid, and then the ordinary coverings. A person floats on these beds as on 

23 



178 Pressure [Book IT. 

balls of caoutchouc, which of late years have been introduced as parlor 
toys for children, rebound from the objects they strike by the spring of 
the air they contain. In the boy's pop gun, that is formed of a quill, the 
tiny pellet is sent on its harmless errand by the elastic energy of the com- 
pressed fluid. And in the air gun, it is the elasticity of the same fluid 
that projects balls with the force of gunpowder. If it were not elastic, 
people when fanning themselves would feel it thrown against their per- 
sons like water or sand. The act of inhaling it would be painful, for it 
would enter the chest by gluts, while its pulsations in sound would quickly 
destroy the membranes of the ear. 

Perhaps nothing is better calculated to expand our ideas of the proper- 
ties of matter, and of the wonders of creation, than the compressibility 
and dilatability of air. From the last named quality, it is probable that 
there is no such thing in nature as an absolute vacuum ; and the best of 
our air pumps can scarcely be said to make even a rude approximation 
to one ! Those, whose knowledge of nature is confined to impressions 
which things make on their senses, may suppose that the extremes of so- 
lidity may be found in a pig of lead and a bale of spunge ; although the 
former is, in all probability, as full of interstices as the latter ; and such 
persons could with difficulty be made to believe, that the entire mass of 
matter (air) which fills a space so immeasurably large as to baffle all cal- 
culation could be compressed into a lady's thimble, and even squeezed in- 
to a liquid drop, so minute, as scarcely to be perceived at the end of a 
needle. 

Like all other matter with which we are acquainted, air has weight. 
This property is not naturally evident to our senses, but it may easily be 
rendered so. By accurately weighing a bladder when filled with air and 
afterwards when empty, it will be found heavier when full. This was 
an experiment of the ancients, but the moderns have ascertained its de- 
finite weight. A cubic foot of it, near the earth's surface, weighs about 
1 J ounces or -g-^- part that of water, a cubic foot of the latter weighing 
1000 ounces ; hence the expression " water is 800 times heaver than air." 
The aggregate weight of the atmosphere has been calculated at up- 
wards of 77 billions of tons, being equivalent to a solid globe of lead 60 
miles in diameter ; hence its pressure, for this enormous weight reposes 
incessantly upon the earth's surface, and upon every object, animate or 
inanimate, solid, liquid, or aeriform. The pressure it thus exerts, (in all 
places that are not greatly elevated above the level of the sea) is equal to 
to about 15 lbs. on every superficial square inch. Thus an ordinary sized 
person exposes so large a surface to its influence, that the aggregate 

water alone, for the liquid in the bag adapts itself to the uneven surface of the body, and 
supports every part reposing upon it, with a uniform pressure. Water beds were how- 
ever known to the ancients, for Plutarch (in his life of Alexander) states that the people 
in the province of Babylon slept during the hot months, " on skins filled with water." 

The luxury of the ancients with regard to beds was carried to a surprising ex- 
tent. They were of down, of the wool of Miletus, and sometimes stuffed with pea 
cock's feathers. The Romans had linen sheets, white as snow, and quilts of needle 
work, and sometimes of cloth of gold. Bedsteads among the rich Greeks and Romans 
were sometimes of ivory, of ebony, and other rich woods, with inlaid work, and figures 
in relief. Some were of massive silver, and even of gold, with feet of onyx. They 
had them also of iron. One of that material was found in Pompeii. The earliest me- 
tallic bedstead mentioned in history is that of Og, king of Bashan. The Persians had 
slaves expressly for bed making, and the art became famous in Rome. Golden beds 
often formed part of the plunder which the generals exhibited at their triumphs. The 
Athenians put Timagoras their ambassador to Persia to death, for accepting presents 
from the king, among which was a " magnificent bed with servants to make it." Plu- 
tarch in Pclopidas. 



'"'hap. 1.] of the Atmosphere. 179 

pressure which his body sustains is not less than 14 or 15 tons. "Not less 
than what ]" once exclaimed an elderly and corpulent lady. " Why how 
can that be ] We could neither talk, nor walk, nor even move ; and be- 
sides, sir, if that is the case, why don't we feel it V For a very simple 
f-eason, though at the first view not a very obvious one. Air, as a fluid, 
presses equally in every direction — upwards as well as downwards — side- 
ways and every way. Its component particles are so inconceivably 
minute, that they enter all substances, even liquids. Air is mixed up and 
circulates with the blood of all animals; it penetrates all the ramifications 
and innermost recesses of our porous bodies, and by the pressure of its 
superincumbent strata is urged through them, almost as freely as through 
the fleece of wool on a sheep's back, or between the fibres and threads 
of a ball of silk. Now, it is this circulation through the interior of our 
bodies that balances its pressure without. If its weight upon us were not 
thus neutralized, we certainly could neither talk nor walk : the lips of the 
loudest speaker, when once closed, could never be opened. We should be 
as mute and immoveable as if enclosed in statues of lead. And we should 
feel it, too — that is, for a moment; for it would as effectually crush us to 
death, as if we were placed in mortars, and pestles, each weighing 14 or 
15 tons, were suddenly dropped upon us. 

It is the air within the breast of the mother that forces milk into an 
infant's mouth, when the latter, by instinct, removes the external pressure 
from the nipple by sucking. It is the same with all mammiferous animals. 
The operation of cupping is another illustration of the same thing : the 
rarefaction of the air under the cup produces a partial vacuum within it ; 
and as the external pressure of the atmosphere is removed from that part 
which is under it, the internal pressure urges the blood through the 
wounds. Were cupping instruments applied over the eyes, those organs 
would be protruded from their sockets. 

As it is the pressure of the atmosphere upon which the action of the 
machines about to be described principally depends, we shall extend our 
remarks upon it. 

Suppose a specimen of delicate fillagrane work, formed of the finest 
threads and plates, and of the human form and size, were sunk in water to 
the depth of 34 or 35 feet ; it would then be exposed to the same degree 
of pressure to which our bodies are subject from the atmosphere ; and 
when drawn up, it would be found uninjured, because the water entering 
into all its cavities, pressed just as much against its interior surfaces as the 
liquid around it against the exterior. But if it were enclosed in a skin or 
flexible covering, impervious to water, and then sunk as before, the pres- 
sure of the liquid around its exterior (not being balanced by any within) 
would crush it into a shapeless mass. Just so would it be with our 
bodies, and those of all terrestrial animals, if the air within them did not 
counteract the pressure without. And as long as this interior circulation 
remains, we can no more feel the pressure of the atmosphere than a fish 
feels that of water ; nor can we be deranged or compressed by it, any 
more than a bundle of wool is, or a mass of entangled wire. It was 
ignorance of this simple fact — air in the interior of bodies exactly balancing 
the exterior pressure — that led the ancients astray, and induced one of the 
most sagacious intellects that was ever clothed in humanity (Aristotle) to 
ascribe this pressure to " nature's abhorrence of a vacuum." 

Since the invention of the air-pump in 1654, numerous experiments 
are made, which demonstrate the pressure of the atmosphere. By it, this 
pressure may be removed from one part of the body, while it is left free 
to act with undiminished energy on the opposite part ; as when the palm 



iSO Illustrations [Book II. 

of the hand is held over the aperture of an exhausted receiver, the weight 
or pressure of the air on the back being no longer balanced by its action 
on the palm, the hand is irresistibly held to the vessel. A criminal or 
maniac, whose hands and feet are thus treated, would be as effectually 
secured as by fetters of iron. Few things are better calculated to excite 
wonder, and even horror, in the savage mind, than a part of the body 
being thus rendered helpless, as if spell-bound by some invisible agent. 
A few years ago, an experiment was made with the chief of a delegation 
of Pottawatamies to the seat of government, at which the writer was 
present. Although the interpreter previously endeavored to make them 
understand the intended operation, it will readily be supposed that such 
an attempt must necessarily have been fruitless. When the receiver was 
exhausted, he was amazed to find his hand immoveable, and that, like 
Jeroboam's, " he could not pull it in again to him." In his endeavors to 
free it, he rapidly uttered the characteristic interjections, ugh ! ugh ! and 
at last shrieked, as if in despair of being delivered from the power of the 
white enchanter ; when his attending warriors flourished their tomahawks 
and rushed to his rescue, as if roused by the war-whoop. 

It is not, however, necessary to have recourse to the air-pump, for 
proofs of atmospheric pressure. Numerous operations daily occur in 
common life which equally establish it. When a person washes his 
hands, if he lock them together so as to bring the palms close to each 
other, and then attempt to raise the central parts so as to form a cavity 
between them, at the same time keeping the extremities of the palms in 
close contact, he will feel the atmospheric pressure very sensibly : if the 
experiment be made under water, the effect will be more obvious still. 
Analogous to this is the attempt to open the common household bellows 
when the valve and nozzle are closed. The boards are then forced open 
with difficulty, in consequence of the pressure of the air on their exterior 
not being balanced by its admission within. If the materials and joints 
were made air-tight, and the orifices perfectly closed, the strongest man 
that ever lived could not force them open. This experiment, we believe, 
was familiar to the ancients ; for we are indebted to them for both the 
olacksmith and domestic bellows. Another experiment of theirs, of a 
similar kind, was with the syringe. When the small orifice is closed with 
the finger, the piston is pulled up with difficulty, on account of the air 
pressing on its surface ; and the moment we let go of the handle, it 
instantly drives it back, in whatever position the implement is held. 
The ordinary syringe seldom exceeds three-fourths or one inch in diame- 
ter, and any person can thus draw out the piston ; but one of six or seven 
inches diameter would require a giant's strength ; and one of a foot or 
fifteen inches would resist the efforts of two or three horses. 

Numerous illustrations of atmospheric pressure may be derived from 
the animal kingdom. The boa constrictor when it swallows its prey 
affords one. As soon as this serpent has killed a goat or a deer, he covers 
its surface with saliva : this appears necessary to lay the long hair of these 
animals close, in order to prevent air from passing between the body of 
the victim and the interior of the devourer's throat. After taking the 
head into his mouth, by a wonderful muscular energy he alternately dilates 
and contracts the posterior portions of his body, until the pressure of the 
atmosphere forces into his flexible skin an animal whose bulk greatly 
exceeds that of his own. But if air were to pass between the body of the 
victim and the dilatable gullet of the boa, while the latter was making a 
vacuum to receive it, the pressure of the atmosphere would be neutralized 
as effectually as if a gash were made through his skin in front of the victim 



Jhap. 1.] of Atmospheric Pressure. 181 

The same process may be witnessed in ordinary snakes, for all serpents 
swallow their prey whole. There is no mastication to facilitate degluti- 
tion. Their upper jaws are loosely connected to the head, so that the 
mouth can be opened very wide, to admit larger animals than the size of 
the serpents would lead one to suppose. 

Such examples, it must be admitted, are not very familiar ones ; but 
there is an experiment not much unlike them, that most people have wit- 
nessed, and not a few perform it in their own persons almost daily. In 
every age people have been fond of oysters, and numbers of our citizens 
often luxuriate on a finer and larger species than those which Roman 
epicures formerly imported from Britain. Now, when a gentleman 
indulges in this food in the ordinary way, he affords a striking illustration 
of the pressure of the atmosphere. A large one is opened by the restau- 
rateur, who also loosens the animal from its shell, and presents it on one 
half of the latter. The imitator of the boa then approaches his lips to the 
newly slain victim, and when they come in contact with but a portion of 
it, he immediately dilates his chest as in the act of inspiration, when the 
air, endeavoring to rush into his mouth to inflate the thorax, drives the 
oyster before it, and with a velocity that is somewhat alarming to an 
inexperienced spectator. If any one should doubt this to be effected by 
atmospheric pressure, let him fully inflate his lungs previous to attempting 
thus to draw an oyster into his mouth, and he will find as much difficulty 
to accomplish it as to smoke a pipe or a cigar with his mouth open. 

This philosophical mode of transmitting oysters to the stomach is iden- 
tical in principle with that proposed by Guerricke and Papin, for shooting 
bullets " by the rarefaction of air." a A leaden ball was fitted into the 
breech of a gun-barrel, and the end being closed, a vacuum was produced 
in front of it ; after which the atmosphere was allowed to act suddenly on 
the ball, when it was driven through the tube with the velocity of a thou- 
sand feet in a second. Just so with the oyster : it lays inertly at the 
orifice of the devourer's mouth — a partial vacuum is made in front of it 
by the act of respiration, and on dilating the chest, the atmosphere drives 
it in a twinkling down the natural tube in the throat — though, to be sure, 
with a velocity somewhat less than that of bullets through Papin's gun. 

When two substances, impervious to air, are fitted so close as to exclude 
it from between them, they are held together by its pressure on their 
outsides, and with a force proportioned to the extent of the surfaces in 
contact. Pieces of metal have been ground together so close as to be 
thus united. Two pieces of common window-glass dipped in water, and 
pressed together, are separated with difficulty ; because the water serves 
to expel the air, and prevent its entrance. Glass grinders are frequently 
inconvenienced by this circumstance. If two plates of glass were per- 
fectly plane and smooth, so as wholly to exclude the air from between 
them, they would become united as one. We have heard or read of in- 
stances when they have become actually one, and were cut by a diamond 
as an ordinary single plate. 

The boys' ' sucker,' or ' cleaver,' a circular piece of wet and thick 
leather, about the size of a dollar, is another illustration. This, when 
pressed against a smooth paving or other stone, of five or ten lbs. weight, 
may be used to raise it, by means of a string attached to the centre. 
If one of these, four inches in diameter, were applied to the cranium of a 
bald-headed gentleman, he might be elevated and suspended by it. Dr, 
Arnott recommends them to elevate depressed portions of fractured skulls, 

a Phil. Trans. Abridg. vol. i, 496. 



182 Suspension of Flies, [Book II. 

and for other surgical operations. Possibly they might be applied with 
some advantage to the soft and yielding skulls of infants, in order to pro- 
duce those eminences upon which (according to phrenologists) the habits 
and character of individuals depend, as by means of them the most desira- 
ble organs of thought and passion might be developed, and the opposite 
ones depressed. 

The principle of atmospheric pressure has been introduced by the 
great Parent of the universe into every department of animated and in- 
animate nature. Not only does it perform an important part in the 
vegetable kingdom, but the movements of innumerable animals, on land 
and in water, depend upon it ; while others are enabled by it to protect 
themselves from enemies, and to secure their food and their prey. 
There is something inexpressibly pleasing in examining even the meanest 
specimens of the Creator's workmanship, (if such an expression may be 
allowed) and what is singular, the more closely we search into them, the 
more proofs do we meet with that the most elaborate and the most effi- 
cient of our devices are but rough copies of natural ones, which the lower 
animals vary and apply, according to circumstances, with inimitable dex- 
terity. Some of these will be noticed here ; others will be more appro- 
priately introduced in subsequent chapters. 

The feet of the common house-fly are constructed like the suckers above 
named ; and hence these insects are enabled to run along, and even sleep, 
on the ceilings of our rooms, with their bodies hanging downwards. 
When in an inverted position they place a foot on an object, they spread 
out the sole, to make it touch at every part, so as to exclude the air from 
between; and when the weight of the body tends to draw it away, the 
pressure of the external air retains it ; until the fly, wishing to move, 
raises the edges by appropriate mechanism, and destroys the vacuum. 

There is not a more interesting subject for the contemplation of mecha- 
nics than the movements of these active little beings. To behold them 
running not only along the under side of a plate of glass, but also up, and 
more particularly down a vertical one, with such perfect command over 
their motions, is truly surprising. In the latter case, from the rapidity of 
their movements, and the fact that part only of their feet are in contact 
with the glass at the same time, one might suppose the momentum of their 
moving bodies would carry them over the objects they intended to reach ; 
instead of which, they dart along with a precision and facility as if impelled 
by volition alone. It is strange, too, how they are enabled to produce 
a sufficient vacuum between their tiny feet and the asperities on an ordi- 
nary wall or ceiling ! And with what celerity it is done and undone ! 
How wonderful and how pei-fect must be the mechanism of these natural 
air-pumps ; and how harmonious must that machinery work by which the 
energy of the insect is transmitted to them ! Their movements when on 
the wing present another source of pleasing research. Let any ingenious 
person witness, without admiration if he can, a few of them in a door-way 
open to the sun : one or two will be found floating in the centre, as if at 
rest, until disturbed by the near approach of another, when they dart upon 
it, either in play or in anger, and drive it away ; then resuming their sta- 
tions, they remain as guards upon duty, till called to eject other intruders. 
In these combats they vary their movements into every imaginable direc- 
tion ; they trace in the air every angle and every curve, and change them 
with the velocity of thought. As they are not furnished (like most fishes 
and birds) with rudders in their tails, to assist in thus changing their posi 
tions, but effect it by modifying the action of their wings, how energetic 
must be the force that works these ! And what perfect command must 



Chap. l.J Lizards, Frogs, fyc. against Gravity. 183 

the insect possess over them ! It would seem as if they turned their 
bodies in various directions, by diminishing the velocity of one wing, and 
increasing that of the other ; and also by varying the angle at which they 
strike the air, and descend by closing them or stopping their vibrations. 
And with what vigor and celerity must one of these insects move its deli- 
cate wings in order to elevate its comparatively heavy body ! Yet this 
movement is made quick as the others. It bounds upwards, like a balloon 
released from its cords ; now sailing through a room, sweeping round our 
heads, buzzing at our ears, skimming over the floor, and anon inverting 
its body and resting on the ceiling ! And all this within two or three 
seconds of time, and without any apparent exertion or fatigue. Here is 
a fruitful subject of inquiry to the machinist and aeronaut. All the wonders 
that the automatons of Maelzel and Maillardet ever wrought, are nothing 
compared to those that may yet be accomplished by studying the organi- 
zation and motions of these living machines. 

But there are larger animals than flies that suspend themselves in an 
inverted position. Mr. Marsden, in his " History of Sumatra," (London, 
1811, p. 119) mentions lizards four inches long, which, he observes, are 
the largest reptiles that can walk in an inverted situation. One of them, 
of size sufficient to devour a cockroach, runs on the ceiling of a room, and 
in that situation seizes its prey with the utmost facility. Sometimes, 
however, when springing too eagerly at a fly, they lose their hold, and 
drop to the floor. 

The Gecko of Java and other countries is furnished with similar ap- 
paratus in its feet, by means of which it runs up the smoothest polished 
walls, and even carries a load with it, equal in weight to that of its own 
body. Osbeck mentions lizards in China that ran up and down the walls 
with such agility as " they can scarce be caught." The tree frog of this 
country adheres to the leaves of trees by the tubercles on its toes : a young 
one has sustained itself in an inverted position against the under side of a 
plate of glass. From the observations of E. Jesse, author of 'Gleanings 
of Natural History' it appears that common frogs can occasionally do the 
same. His account is very interesting : " I may here mention a curious 
observation I made in regard to some frogs that had fallen down a small 
area which gave light to one of the windows of my house. The top of 
the area being on a level with the ground, was covered over with some iron 
bars through which the frogs fell. During dry and warm weather when 
they could not absorb much moisture, I observed them to appear almost 
torpid ; but when it rained they became impatient of their confinement, 
and endeavored to make their escape, which they did in the following man- 
ner. The wall of the area was about five feet in height and plas- 
tered and white-washed as smooth as the ceiling of a room ; upon 
this surface the frogs soon found that their claws would render them little 
or no assistance ; they therefore contracted their large feet so as to make 
a hollow in the centre, and by means of the moisture which they had im- 
bibed in consequence of the rain, they contrived to produce a vacuum, so 
that by the pressure of the air on their extended feet, (in the same way that 
we see boys take up a stone by means of a piece of wet leather fastened 
to a string) they ascended the wall and made their escape. This happen- 
ed constantly in the course of three years." — Phil. Ed. 1833. p. 140. 

Innumerable crustaceous animals adhere to rocks and stones by the same 
principle. But it is not the smaller inhabitants of either the land or the 
sea, as flies, spiders, butterflies, bees, &c. some of which scarcely weigh 
a grain ; or lizards and frogs, &c. of five or six ounces, which thus sustain 
themselves against gravity ; for the enormous walrus, that sometimes ex- 



184 Sucking Fish. [Book II 

ceeds a ton in weight, is furnished by the Creator with analogous apparatus 
in his hinder feet; and thus climbs by atmospheric pressure, the glassy sur- 
faces of ice-bergs. How forcibly do these examples illustrate the intimate 
connection which subsists between the various departments of Natural Phi- 
losophy. A knowledge of one always furnishes a key (whether it be used or 
not) to open some of the mysteries of another. Thus a person who under- 
stands the principle by which water is raised in a simple pump, can by it ex- 
plain some of the most surprising facts in the natural history of animals ; 
and solve problems respecting the motions and organs of motions of nu- 
merous tribes of animated beings, which two or three centuries ago, the 
most enlightened philosophers could not comprehend. And with a simple 
pump, he can moreover determine, as with a barometer, the measurement of 
all accessible heights, and with a degree of accuracy that, in some cases, 
is deemed preferable to geometrical demonstrations. 

When two substances are brought together, at some distance below the 
surface of water, and so as to exclude it from between them, they are 
then pressed together with a force greater than when in the air, be 
cause the weight of the perpendicular column of water over them is 
then added to that of the atmosphere. Numerous examples of this com 
bined pressure are also to be found in the natural world. By it, various 
species of fish adhere to rocks and stones in the depths of the sea, from 
which they cannot be separated except by tearing their bodies asunder. 
Some by means of it attach themselves to the bodies of others, and there- 
by traverse the ocean without any expense or exertion of their own, some- 
what like dishonest travelers, who elude the payment of their fare. There 
are several species of fishes known which have a separate organ of adhe 
sion, and there are doubtless many more which have not yet come under 
the observation of man. The most celebrated is the remora or sucking 
fish of Dampier and other navigators. It is, in size and shape, similar to 
a large whiting, except that the head is much flatter. " From the head to 
the middle of its back, (observes Dampier) there groweth a sort of flesh of 
a hard gristly substance, like that of the limpet. This excrescence is of a 
flat oval form, about 7 or 8 inches long, and 5 or 6 broad, and rising about 
half an inch high. It is full of small ridges with which it will fasten itself 
to any thing that it meets with in the sea. "When it is fair weather and 
but little wind, they will play about a ship, but in blustering weather, or 
when the ship sails quick, they commonly fasten themselves to the ship's 
bottom, from whence neither the ship's motion, though never so swift, nor 
the most tempestuous sea can remove them. They will likewise fasten 
themselves to any bigger fish, for they never swim fast themselves, if they 
meet with any thing to carry them. I have found them sticking to a shark 
after it was hal'd in on deck, though a shark is so strong and boisterous a 
fish, and throws about him so vehemently when caught, and for half an 
hour together, that did not the sucking fish stick at no ordinary rate, it 
must needs- be cast off by so much violence."* They are familiar to most 
of our seamen. Other species have a circular organ of adhesion, consist- 
ing of numerous soft papillae, and placed on the thorax, instead of the 
top of the head, as in the remora. In some fish the ventral fins are united 
and are capable of adhesion. In the lamprey the mouth contracts and 

a Dampier's Voyages, vi. edit. 1717, Vol. i, fi4, and Vol. ii, part iii, p. 110. fn the 
the plates of Vol. iii, is a figure of one. Figures of the excrescence or sucking part 
of the remora, and of the feet of the house-fly, may be seen in Dr. Brewster's Letters 
on Natural Magic. 



Chap. 1.] The Remora. 185 

acts as a sucker ; while that curious animal the cuttle fish secures the vic- 
tims that fall into its fatal embraces by the suckers on its arms. 

The prodigious pressure that, at great depths, unites these inhabitants of 
the sea to their prey, led man to employ them to hunt the sea for his 'benefit 
as well as their own. Both the remora and lamprey tribe have been used 
for this purpose. Columbus when on the coast of St. Domingo was greatly 
surprised on beholding the Indians of that island fishing with them. " They 
had a small fish, the flat head of which was furnished with numerous suck- 
ers, by which it attached itself so firmly to any object as to be torn in 
pieces rather than abandon its hold. Tying a long string to the tail, the In- 
dians permitted it to swim at large : it generally kept near the surface till 
it perceived its prey, when darting down swiftly it attached itself to the 
throat of a fish, or to the under shell of a tortoise, when both were drawn 
up by the fisherman." Ferdinand Columbus saw a shark caught in this 
manner. a 

The same mode of fishing was followed at Zanguebar, on the eastern 
coast of Africa. The inhabitants of the coast when fishing for turtle, 
" take a living sucking fish or remora^ and fastening a couple of strings to it, 
(one at the head and the other at the tail) they let the sucking fish down 
into the water on the turtle ground, among the half grown or young turtle; 
and when they find that the fish hath fastened himself to the back of a tur- 
tle, as he will soon do, they draw him and the turtle up together. This 
way of fishing as I have heard is also used at Madagascar."^ 

The remora w T as well known to the ancients. History has preserved 
a fabulous account of their having the power to stop a vessel under sail, 
by attaching themselves to her rudder. A Roman ship belonging to a 
fleet, it is said, was thus arrested, when she " stoode stil as if she had lien 
at anker, not stirring a whit out of her place." There is another illustra- 
tion of the enormous pressure that fishes endure at great depths. The 
small volume of air that is contained in the bladder, and by the expansion 
and contraction of which they ascend and descend, is at the bottom of the 
sea compressed into a space many times smaller than when they swim 
near the surface. (At 33 feet from the surface it occupies but one half.) 
Hence, it frequently occurs that when such fish are suddenly drawn up, 
(as the cod on the banks of Newfoundland) the membrane bursts, in con- 
sequence of the diminished pressure, and the air rushing into the abdomen, 
forces the intestines out of the mouth. From a similar cause, blood is 
forced out of the ears of divers, when the bell that contains them is quickly 
drawn up. This pressure is also evinced in the fact that the timber of 
foundered vessels never rises, because the pores become completely filled 
with water by the pressure of the superincumbent mass, and the wood 
then becomes almost ' heavy as iron.' 

The pressure of the atmosphere on liquids is equally obvious. When 
a bucket or other vessel is sunk in water and then raised in an inverted 
position, the air being excluded from acting on the surface of the liquid 
within, still presses on that without, so that the water is suspended in the 
vessel ; and if the under surface of the liquid could be kept level and at 
rest, water might be transported in buckets thus turned upside down, as 
effectually as in the ordinary mode of conveying it ' 

The experiment with a goblet or tumbler presents a very neat illustra- 
tion. One of these filled with water, and having a piece of writing paper 
laid over it, and held close till the vessel be inverted, will retain the liquid 



a living's Columbus, Vol. i, 273. b Darapier's Voyages, Vol. ii, part ii, 103. 

24 



186 Atmospheric Pressure on Liquids. [Book II 

within it. In this experiment the paper merely preserves the liquid sur- 
face level : it remains perfectly free and loose ; and so far from being 
close to the edge of the glass, it may, while the latter is held in a horizon- 
tal position, be withdrawn several lines from it without the water escaping ; 
and it may be pierced full of small holes with the same effect. 

If an inverted vessel be filled with any material that excludes the air, 
and whose specific gravity is greater than that of water, when lowered 
into the latter, the contents will descend and be replaced by the water. 
A bottle filled with sand, shot, &c. and inverted in water, will have its 
contents exchanged for the latter. As these substances, however, do not 
perfectly Jill the vessel, and of course do not exclude all the air, the 
experiment succeeds better when the vessel contains heavy liquids, as 
mercury, sulphuric acid, &c. It is said that negroes in the West Indies 
often insert the long neck of a bottle filled with water, into the bung-holes 
of rum puncheons, when the superior gravity of the water (in this case) 
descends, and is gradually rej)laced with the lighter spirit. 

In the preceding examples and those in subsequent chapters, it will be 
found that wherever a vacuity or partial vacuum is formed, the adjacent 
air, by the pressure above, rushes in and drives before it the object that 
intervenes, until the void is filled. If the nozzle of a pair of bellows be 
closed, either by the finger or by a small valve opening outwards ; and a 
«hort pipe, the lower end of which is placed in water, be secured to the 
opening in the under board which is covered by the clapper ; then if the 
bellows be opened, the pressure of the atmosphere will drive the water 
up the pipe to fill the enlarged cavity, and by then closing the boards, 
the liquid will be expelled through the nozzle. Bellows thus arranged 
become sucking or atmospheric, and forcing pumps. When the orifice of 
a syringe is inserted into a vessel of water and the piston drawn up, the 
air having no way to enter the vacuity thus formed than by the small 
orifice under the surface of the liquid, presses the water before it into the 
body of the syringe. 

As every machine described in this book, and most of those in the next 
one, both proves and illustrates atmospheric pressure on liquids, we need 
not enlarge further upon it here. There are however some other parti- 
culars relating to it, which are necessary to be known : first, that its 
pressure is limited ; and secondly, that it varies in intensity at different 
parts of the earth, according to their elevation above the surface of the sea. 
These important facts are clearly established in the accounts given of the 
discovery of the air's pressure, a sketch of which can scarcely be out of 
place here, since it was a pump that first drew the attention of modern 
philosophers to the subject, and which thereby became the proximate 
cause of a revolution in philosophical research, that will ever be consi- 
dered an epoch in the history of science. 



Chap. 2.] Discovery of Atmospheric Pressure. 187 



CHAP TE R II. 

Discovery of atmospheric pressure — Circumstances which led to it — Galileo — Torricelli — Beautiful 
experiment of the latter— Controversy respecting- the results — Pascal— his demonstration of the cause 
of the ascent of water in pumps — Invention of the air-pump — Barometer and its various applications — 
Intensity of atmospheric pressure different at different parts of the earth — A knowledge of this necessary 
to pump-makers — The limits to which water may be raised in atmospheric pumps known to ancient 
pump -makers. 

In the year 1641, a pump-maker of Florence made an atmospheric, or 
what was called a sucking pump, the pipe of which extended from 50 to 
60 feet above the water. When put in operation, it was of course inca- 
pable of raising any over 32 or 33 feet. Supposing this to have been 
occasioned by some defect in the construction, the pump was carefully 
examined, and being found perfect, the operation was repeated, but with 
the same results. After numerous trials, the superintendent of the Grand 
Duke's water works, according to whose directions it had been made, 
consulted Galileo, who was a native of the city, and then resided in it. 
Previous to this occurrence, it was universally supposed that water was 
raised in pumps by an occult power in nature, which resisted with con- 
siderable force all attempts to make a void, but which, when one was 
made, used the same force to fill it, by urging the next adjoining substance, 
if a fluid, into the vacant space. Thus in pumps, when the air was with- 
drawn from their upper part by the ' sucker,' nature, being thus violated, 
instantly forced water up the pipes. No idea was entertained by philo- 
sophers at this or any preceding period, that we know of, that this force 
was limited ; that it would not as readily force water -tip a perpendicular 
tube, from which the air was withdrawn, 100 feet high as well as 20 — to 
the top of a high building as well as to that of a low one. 

When the circumstances attending the trial of the pump at Florence 
were placed before Galileo, (his attention having probably never before 
been so closely directed to the subject) he could only reply, that nature's 
abhorrence to a vacuum was limited, and that it " ceased to operate above 
the height of 32 feet." This opinion given at the moment, it is believed 
was not satisfactory to himself; and his attention having now been roused, 
there can be no doubt that he would have discovered the real cause, had 
he lived, especially as he was then aware that the atmosphere did exert a 
definite pressure on objects on the surface of the earth. But at that period 
this illustrious man was totally blind, nearly 80 years of age, and within a 
few months of his death. The discovery is however, in some measure, 
due to him. It has also "been supposed that he communicated his ideas 
on the subject to Torricelli, who lived in his family and acted as his 
amanuensis during the last three months of his life. 

It was in 1643 that Torricelli announced the great discovery that water 
was raised in pumps by the pressure of the air. This he established by 
very satisfactory experiments. The apparatus in his first one, was made 
in imitation of the Florentine pump. He procured a tube 60 feet long, 
and secured it in a perpendicular position, with its lower end in water ; 
then having by a syringe extracted the air at its upper end, he found the 
water rose only 32 or 33 feet, nor could he by any effort induce it I ) 



188 Torricelli. [Book II. 

ascend higher. He then reduced the length of the pipe to 40 feet, without 
any better success. It now occurred to him, that if it really was the 
atmosphere which supported this column of water in the pipe, then, if he 
employed some other liquid, the specific gravity of which, compared with 
that of water, was known, a column of such liquid would be sustained in 
the tube, of a length proportioned to its gravity. This beautiful thought 
he soon submitted to the test of experiment, and by a very neat and simple 
apparatus. 

Quicksilver being 14 times heavier than water, he selected it as the 
most suitable, since the apparatus would be more manageable ; and from 
the small dimensions of the requisite tube, a syringe to exhaust the air 
could be dispensed with. He therefore took a glass tube about four feet 
long, sealed at one end and open at the other. This he completely filled 
with quicksilver, which of course expelled the air ; then placing his finger 
on the open end, he inverted the tube, and introduced the open end below 
the surface of a quantity of mercury in an open vessel; then moving the 
tube into a vertical position, he withdrew his finger, when part of the 
mercury descended into the basin, leaving a vacuum in the upper part of 
the tube, while the rest was supported in it at the height of about 28 
inches, as he had suspected, being one-fourteenth of the height of the 
aqueous column. This simple and truly ingenious experiment was fre- 
quently varied and repeated, but always with the same result, and must 
have imparted to Torricelli the most exquisite gratification. 8 

Accounts of Torricelli's experiments were soon spread throughout Eu- 
rope, and every where caused an unparalleled excitement among philoso- 
phers. This was natural, for his discovery prostrated the long cherished 
hypothesis of nature's abhorence of a vacuum; and at the same time, opened 
unexplored regions to scientific research. It met however with much 
opposition, particularly from the Jesuits ; in many of whom it is said to 
have excited a degree of ' horror' similar to that experienced by them on 
the publication of Galileo's dialogues on the Ptolemaic and Copernican 
systems. They and others resisted the new doctrine with great perse- 
verance, and even endeavored to reconcile the results of the experiments 
with the fuga vacui they so long had cherished. It was ingeniously con- 
tended that the experiment with quicksilver no more proved that the force 
which sustained it in the tube was the pressure of the atmosphere, than the 
column of water did in the first experiment ; allowing this, it proved that 
this force, whatever it was, varied in its effects on different liquids, accord- 
ing to their specific gravity ; a fact previously unknown, and apparently 
inconsistent with nature's antipathy to a void, which might be supposed to 
produce the same effects on all fluids — to have as great an abhorence to 
mercury as to water. 

During the discussion great expectations were entertained by the advo- 
cates of the new doctrine from Torricelli ; but unfortunately, this philoso- 
pher died suddenly in the midst of his pursuits and in the very vigor of 
manhood, viz. in his 39th year. This took place in 1647. The subject 
was however too interesting, and too important in its consequences, to be 
lost sight of. He had opened a new path into the fields of science, and 
philosophers in every part of Europe had rushed into it with too much 
ardor to be stopped by his decease. Among the most eminent of those 

a The apparatus employed in these experiments was not original with Torricelli. 
The air thermometer of C. Drebble, the famous alchemist, who died in 1634, was of the 
same construction, except that the upper end of the inverted tube was swelled into a 
bulb. It is frequently figured in Fludd's works. 



Chap. 2.] Pascal and Terrier. 189 

was Pascal, a French mathematician and divine. In 1646 he undertook 
to verify the experiments of Torricelli, and still further to vary them. 
He used tubes of glass forty feet long, having one end closed to avoid 
the use of a syringe. He filled one with wine and another with water, and 
inverted them into basins containing the same liquids, after the manner of 
Torricelli's mercurial experiment. As the specific gravity of these liquids 
was not the same, he anticipated a difference in the length of the two co- 
lumns ; and such was the fact. The water remained suspended at the 
height of thirty-one feet one inch and four lines ; while the lighter wine 
stood at thirty-three feet three inches. Pascal was attacked with great 
virulence by Father Noel, a Parisian Jesuit, who resisted the new doctrine 
with infuriate zeal, as if it also was heresy, like Galileo's doctrine of the 
earth's motion round the sun. 

After making several experiments, one at length occured to Pascal, 
which he foresaw would, if successful, effectually silence all objectors. 
He reasoned thus : If it is really the weight or pressure of the atmosphere, 
that sustains water in pumps, and mercury in the tube, then, the intensity 
of this pressure will be less on the top of a mountain than at its foot, be- 
cause there is a less portion of air over its summit than over its base ; if 
therefore a column of mercury is sustained at 28 or any other number of 
inches at the. base of a very high mountain, this column ought to diminish 
gradually as the tube is carried up to the top ; whereas, if the atmosphere 
has no connection with the ascent of liquids, (as contended) then the mer- 
cury will remain the same at all elevations, at the base as at the summit. 
Being at Paris, he addressed a letter to his brother-in-law, M. Perrier, 
(in 1647) from which the following is an extract : " I have thought of an 
experiment, which, if it can be executed with accuracy, will alone be suf- 
ficient to elucidate this subject. It is to repeat the Torricellian experi- 
ment several times in the same day, with the same tube, and the 
same mercury ; sometimes at the foot, sometimes at the summit of 
a mountain five or six hundred fathoms in height. By this means 
we shall ascertain whether the mercury in the tube will be at the 
same or a different height at each of these stations. You perceive with- 
out doubt that this experiment is decisive ; for if the column of mercury 
be lower at the top of the hill than at the base, as I think it will, it clear- 
ly shows that the pressure of the air is the sole cause of the suspension 
of the mercury in the tube, and not the horror of a vacuum ; as it is evi- 
dent there is a longer column of air at the bottom of the hill than at the 
top ; but it would be absurd to suppose that nature abhors a vacuum 
more at the base than at the summit of a hill. For if the suspension of 
the mercury in the tube is owing to the pressure of the air, it is plain it 
must be equal to a column of air, whose diameter is the same with 
that of the mercurial column, and whose height is equal to that of the 
atmosphere, from the surface of the mercury in the basin. Now the base 
remaining the same, it is evident the pressure will be in proportion to the 
height of the column, and that the higher the column of air is, the longer 
will be the column of mercury that will be sustained." This experimen- 
turn cruris, was made on the 19th September, 1648, the year after Torri- 
celli's death, on the Puy de Dome, near Clermont, the highest mountain in 
France ; and the result was just as Pascal had anticipated. The mercury 
fell in the tube as M. Perrier ascended with it up the mountain, and when 
he reached the summit it was three inches lower than when at the base. 
The experiment was repeated on different sides of the mountain, and 
continued by Perrier till 1651, but always with the same results. Pas- 
cal made others on the top of some of the steeples in Paris ; and all 



190 Limits of Atmospheric Pressure [Book II. 

proved the same important truth, viz. that the pressure of the atmosphere 
was that mysterious power, which under the name of nature's abhorrence 
to a vacuum had so long eluded the researches of philosophers. The sub- 
ject was taken up in England by Boyle, who pursued it with unremitted 
ardor, and whose labors have immortalized his name ; but it was Germany 
that bore off the most valuable of the prizes which the discovery offered 
to philosophers. The Torricellian experiment gave rise to the air pump ; 
and in 1654, a Prussian philosopher, a mathematician and a magistrate, 
Otto Guerricke, of Magdeburgh, made public experiments with it at Ratis- 
bon, before the emperor of Germany and several electors. Some authors 
ascribe the invention of the pump to Candido del Buono, one of the mem- 
bers of the Academie del Cimento at Florence, and intimate that the first 
essays with it were only made by Guerricke. 

The apparatus of Torricelli, i. e. the glass tube and basin of mercury, 
was named a baroscope, and afterwards a barometer, because it measured 
the pressure of the atmosphere at all elevations ; hence to it, engineers 
in all parts of the earth may have recourse, to determine the perpendicular 
length of the pipes of atmospheric pumps. 

Another application of the barometer was the natural result of Perrier's 
first experiment on the Puy de Dome. As he ascended that mountain 
with it, the mercury kept falling in exact proportion to the elevation to 
which the instrument was carried ; hence it is obvious, that when the 
tube is properly graduated, it will measure the height of mountains, and 
all other elevations to which it can be carried. By it, aeronauts deter- 
mine the height to which they ascend in balloons. The observations of 
Perrier were continued daily from 1649 to 1651, during which he per- 
ceived that the height of the column slightly varied with the temperature, 
wind, rain, and other circumstances of the atmosphere ; and hence the 
instrument indicated changes of weather, and became known and is still 
used as a " tveather glass." The extent of these variations is about 
three inches, generally ranging from twenty-eight to thirty-one, and are 
principally confined to the temperate zones. In tropical regions, the 
pressure is nearly uniform, the mercury standing at about thirty inches 
throughout the year. These facts have an important bearing on our sub- 
ject ; for an atmospheric pump or siphon, with a perpendicular pipe thirty- 
four or thirty-five feet long, might operate during certain states of the at- 
mosphere, while in others it could not ; and in some parts of the earth it 
would be altogether useless. 

It will appear in the sequel, that the physical properties of the atmos- 
phere which we have enumerated, must necessarily be understood, in 
order perfectly to comprehend the action of the machines we have to de- 
scribe. As regards the aerial pressure, its limits and variation at different 
altitudes, we need only remark, that a sucking pump or a siphon, which 
raises water thirty-three feet in New-York and Buenos Ayres, London 
and Calcutta, St. Petersburgh and Port Jackson in New Holland, could 
not, in the city of Mexico, elevate it over twenty-two feet; and at Quito, 
and Santa Fe de Bogota in South America, and Gondar the capital of 
Abyssinia twenty feet, on account of the great elevation of these cities ; 
(from the same cause, the pressure of the atmosphere on Mont Blanc is 
only about half that on the plains) and if Condamine and Humboldt, 
when on the summit of Pinchincha, had applied one to raise water there, or 
on the side of Antisana, at the spot where, from the great rarity or tenuity 
of the air, the face of the latter philosopher was streaming with blood, his 
attendant fainted, and the whole party exhausted, it would not have raised 
water over twelve or fourteen feet ; (the mercurv in the barometer fell 



Chap. 3.] Known to old Pump Makers. 191 

to fourteen inche3 seven lines,) while on the highest ridge of the Hima- 
layas, it would scarcely raise it eight or ten feet. Without a knowledge 
of aerial pressure, it is obvious, that engineers who visit Mexico,' and the 
upper regions of South America, &c. might get into a quandary greatly 
more perplexing than that in which the Florentine was, when he applied 
to Galileo : but we believe the period has nearly gone by, for mechanics 
to remain ignorant of those principles of science, upon which their profes- 
sions are based. 

It perhaps may be asked, Were the limits to which water can be raised 
by the atmosphere not known before Galileo's time 1 Undoubtedly they 
were. Pump makers must always haue been acquainted with them ; al- 
though philosophers might not have noticed the fact or paid any attention 
to the subject. Why then did the Italian artists make such a one as that 
to which we have referred 1 Simply because they were ordered to do 
so, as any mechanic would now do under similar circumstances : at the 
same time they declared that it would not raise the water, although they 
could not assign any reason for the assertion. It was indeed impossible 
for ancient pump makers to have remained ignorant of the extent to which 
their machines were applicable. A manufacturer of them would naturally 
extend their application, as occasions occurred, to wells of every depth, 
until he became familiar with the fact that the power which caused the 
water to ascend, was limited — and until he detected the limits. After 
using a pump with success, to raise water twenty-five or thirty feet, 
when he came to apply it to wells of forty or fifty feet in depth without 
lengthening the cylinder, he would necessarily learn the important, and 
to him mysterious fact, that the limits were then exceeded : and after 
probably going through similar examinations and consultations, as those 
which took place at Florence in the 17th century, the unvarying result 
would become so firmly established, that every workman would learn it 
traditionally, as an essential part of his profession : and if in succeeding 
ages, the knowledge of it became lost, the experience of every individual 
pump maker must have soon taught him the same truth. Attempts then 
similar to those of the Florentine engineer occurred frequently before, but 
leading to no important result, the particulars of them have not been pre- 
served ; nor is it probable that those relating to the Italian experiment 
would have been, had not the father of modern philosophy been consulted, 
and had not his pupil Torricelli taken up the subject. 



CHAPTER III. 

Ancient Experiments on air— Various applications of it— Siphons used in ancient Egypt — Primitive 
experiments with vessels inverted in water — Suspension of liquids in them — Ancient atmospheric sprink- 
ling pot— Watering Gardens with it— Probably referred to by St. Paul and also by Shakespeare— Glass 
sprinkling vessel, and a wine taster from Pompeii — Religious uses of sprinkling pots among the ancient 
heathen — Figure of one from Montfaucon — Vestals — Miracle of Tutia carrying water in a sieve, describ- 
ed and explained— Modern liquor taster and dropping tubes — Trick performed with various liquids 
by a Chinese juggler— Various frauds of the ancients with liquids — Divining cups. 

Notwithstanding the alledged ignorance of the ancients respecting the 
physical properties of the atmosphere, there are circumstances related in 
history which seem to indicate the reverse ; or which, at any rate, show 



L92 Ancient Experiments on Air. [Book II 

that air was a frequent subject of investigation with their philosophers, 
and that its influence in some natural phenomena was well understood. 
Thus Diogenes of Apollonia, the disciple and successor of Anaximenes, 
reasoned on its condensation and rarefaction. According to Aristotle, Era- 
pcdocles accounted for respiration in animals by the weight of the air, 
which said he, " by its pressure insinuates itself with force into the lungs." 
Plutarch expresses in the very same terms, the sentiments of Asclepiades, 
representing him among other things as saying that the external air, " by 
its weight, opened its way with force into the breast." Lucretius, in ex- 
plaining the property of the loadstone in drawing iron, observed that it 
repelled the intervening air betwixt itself and the iron, thus forming a 
vacuum, when the iron is " pushed on by the air behind it." Plutarch 
was of the same opinion.* Vitruvius speaks of the pressure of air, Arch, 
book viii, cap. 3. When Flaminius, during the celebration of the Isthmi- 
an games, proclaimed liberty to the Greeks, the shout which the people 
gave in the transport of their joy was so great, that some crows, which hap- 
pened to be then flying over their heads, fell down into the theatre. Plu- 
tarch among other explanations of the phenomenon, suggests, that the 
" sound of so many voices being violently strong, the parts of the air were 
separated by it, and a void left which afforded the birds no support." 1 * 

But if the ancients did not detect or comprehend the direct pressure of 
the atmosphere, they were not ignorant of its effects, or of the means of 
exciting it. They in fact employed air in many of their devices as success- 
fully as the moderns. They compressed it in air guns, and weighed it in 
bladders ; its elasticity produced continuous jets in their fountains and 
force pumps, in the same manner as in ours ; by its pressure, they raised 
water in syringes and pumps, and transferred it through siphons, precisely 
as we do ; they excluded its pressure from the upper surface of water 
in their sprinkling pots, and admitted it to empty them, as in the modern 
liquor merchant's taster. That they had condensing air pumps is evident 
from the wind guns of Ctesibius, as well as others described by Vitruvius, 
b. x, cap. 13 ; and it is probable that they employed air in numerous other 
machines and for other purposes, but of which, from the loss of their 
writings, no account has been preserved. See Vitruvius, book x, cap. 1, 
where some are referred to, and Pliny Nat. Hist, book xix, cap. 4. 

It would be in vain to attempt to discover the origin of devices for 
raising liquids by the pressure of the atmosphere, for it would require a 
knowledge of man and of the state of the arts, in those remote ages of 
which no record is extant. That machines for the purpose were made 
long before the commencement of history is certain, for recent discov- 
eries have brought to light the highly interesting fact, that siphons were 
known in Egypt 1450 years before our era, i. e. 3290 years ago ! At 
which period too they seem to have been in more common use in that 
country, than they are at this day with us. [See Book V, for an account 
of these instruments.] 

The retention of water in inverted vessels while air is excluded from 
them, could not have escaped observation in the rudest ages. Long ere 
natural phenomena had awakened curiosity in the human mind, or roused 
the spirit of philosophical inquiry and research, it must have been noticed. 
When a person immerses a bucket in a reservoir and raises it in an in- 
verted position, he soon becomes sensible that it is not the weight of the 
vessel merely which he has to overcome, but also that of the water within 

a Duten's Inquiry into the Origin of the Discoveries attributed to the Moderns. Lon 
1769, pp. 186, 187 203. b Life of Flaminius. 



Chap. 3.J Sprinkling Pot. 193 

it; and not till the mouth emerges into air do the contents rush out and 
leave the bucket alone in his hands. This is one of those circumstances 
that has occurred more or less frequently to most persons in every age. It 
would be absurd to suppose that the groups of oriental females' who, 
from the remotest times, have assembled twice a day to visit the fountains 
or rivers for water, did not often perform the experiment, both incidentally 
and by design. They could not in fact plunge their water pots (which were 
often without handles) into the gushing fount without occasionally repeating 
it ; nor could Andromache and her maids fill buckets to water the horses 
of Hector, and daily charge pitchers in the stream for domestic uses, with- 
out being sometimes diverted by it. But the phenomenon thus exhibited 
was not confined to such occasions; on the contrary, it constantly occurred 
in every dwelling. An ancient domestic like a modern house-maid, could 
hardly wash a cup or rinse a goblet by immersion, without encountering it. 
Besides the vessels named, there were others that formed part of the or- 
dinary kitchen furniture of the ancients, (see figures of some on page 16) 
the daily use of which would vary and illustrate it. These were long 
necked and narrow mouthed vases and bottles, that retained liquids when 
inverted like some of our vials. Others were still further contracted in 
the mouth, as the Ampulla, which gave out its contents only by drops. 
To the ordinary use of these vessels and to incidental experiments made 
with them, may be traced the origin of our fountain lamps and inkstands, 
bird fountains, and other similar applications of the same principle. 

The suspension of a liquid in inverted vessels by the atmosphere, was 
therefore well known to the early inhabitants of the world, whether 
they understood the reason of its suspension or not; and when in subse- 
quent times philosophers began to search into causes and effects, the phe- 
nomenon was well calculated to excite their attention, and to lead them to 
inquiries respecting air and a vacuum : it is probable that it did so, for the 
earliest experiments on these subjects, of which we have any accounts, 
were similar to those domestic manipulations to which we have alluded, 
and the principal instrument employed was simply a modification of a gob- 
let inverted in water. This was the atmospheric ' sprinkling pot,' or 
* watering siphon,' which is so often referred to by the old philosophers, 
in their disputes on a plenum and a vacuum. It has long been obsolete, 
and not having been noticed by modern authors, few general readers are 
aware that such an instrument was ever in use, much less that it formed 
part of the philosophical apparatus of the ancient world. 

The interesting associations connected with it and its modifications en- 
title it to a place here. Indeed were there no other reason for attempting 
to preserve it a little longer from oblivion, than that indicsced at the close- 
of the last paragraph, we should not feel justified in passing it by. It is- 
moreover, for aught that is known to the contrary, the earliest instrument 
employed in hydro-pneumatical researches. Its general form and uses 
may be gathered from the remarks of Athenagoras respecting it. This 
philosopher, who flourished in the fifth century, B. C. made use of it to 
illustrate his views of a vacuum. " This instrument (says he) which is 
acuminated or pointed towards the top, and made of clay or any other 
material, (and used as it often has, for the watering of gardens) is, in the 
bottom very large and plain [flat] but full of small holes like a sieve, but 
at the top has only one large hole."* When it was plunged in water, the 
liquid entered through the numerous holes in its bottom ; after which 
the single opening at top was closed by the finger to exclude the air ; the 

a As quoted by Switzer from Bockler, Hyd. 167. 

25 * 



194 



Watering Plants with the Atmosphheric Garden Pot. [Book II 



and the latter discharged at 



vessel and its contents were then raised 
pleasure by removing the finger. 

As this was the ancient garden pot of the Greeks, Pliny probably re- 
fers to it when he speaks of ' sprinkling* water, oil, vinegar, &c. on plants 
and roots. a It appears to have been continued in use for such purposes 
in Europe, through the middle ages ; and to a limited extent up to the 17th 
and 18th centuries. b Figures of it are, however, rarely to be met with, 
for it seems to have been nearly forgotten when the discovery of Torri- 
celli revived the old discussions on a vacuum; and though Boyle and others 
then occasionally referred to it, few, we believe, gave its figured Mont- 
faucon speaks of examining an ancient ' watering stick,' and also a 
' sprinkling pot,' but unfortunately he has not described either. d Of 
a great number of old philosophical works that 
we have examined for the purpose of obtaining a 
figure, we met with it only in Fludd's works. The 
annexed cut is from his De Naturse Simia seu Tech- 
nica macrocosmi historia.' Oppenheim, 1618, p. 473. 
The mode of using it is too obvious to require expla- 
nation. It was pushed into water in the position re- 
presented ; the liquid entered through the openings 
in the bottom, driving the air out of the small orifice 
at the top ; and when it was filled, the person using 
it placed his finger or thumb on the orifice and then 
moved, the vessel over the plants, &c. he wished to 
water ; discharging the contents by raising the finger. 

No. 69. Ancient Watering Pot. 

The application of this instrument as a ' garden pot' may sometimes be 
found portrayed in devices, rebuses, vignettes, &c. of old printers. In 
the title page of Godwin's Annals of Henry VIII, Edward VI, and 
Mary, (a thin latin folio published in 1616) it is represented. No. 70 is a 
copy. There is a similar engraving on the title page of a volume on 
farming, &c. entitled ' Maison Rustique,' translated from the French, and 
published in London by John Islip, the same year. 





No. 70. Watering plants with the Atmospheric Sprinkling Pot. 

Independently of the sprinkling pot, the cut is interesting as exhibiting 

■ Nat. Hist, xvii, 11 and 28 ; xix, 12 ; and xv, 17. b Dictionnaire De Trevoux, Art. 
Arrosoir. c Boyle's Philosophical works, by Shaw, Lon. 1725. Vol. ii, pp. 140, 144 
d Italian Diary, Lon. 1725, 295. 



Chap. 3.1 



Sprinkler and Wine- Taster from Pompeii. 



195 



the ancient mode of transplanting. It appears that two men were gener- 
ally employed in the operation ; one to set the trees or plants, and another 
to water them ; a custom to which St. Paul alludes in 1 Cor. iii, 6 — 8. 
Sometimes ' he that watered' used two pots at the same time, holding one 
in each hand. As these vessels were not wholly disused in Shakespeare's 
time, it is probable, that to them he refers in Lear : 

Why, this would make a man, a man of salt, [tears] 

To use his eyes for garden water pots. Act 4, Scene C. 

Modifications of them were adapted to various purposes by the ancients. 
They w r ere used to drop water on floors in order to lay the dust, in both 
Greek and Roman houses. Their general form was that of a pitcher or 
vase, and their dimensions varied with their uses. Some of the small- 
est had but a single hole in the bottom. They formed part of the ordin- 
ary culinary apparatus, and were also used in religious services. Among 
the antiquities disinterred at Pompeii, some have been found. No. 71 
represents one : it is of glass, the upper part of the tube or neck is want- 
ing, having been broken off. Perhaps this part resembled the form indi- 
cated by the dotted lines which we have added. 

No. 72, also of glass, 
has been pronounced ' a 
wine-taster, the air hav- 
ing been exhausted by 
sucking at the small end.' 
It is more likely that the 
w r ide part was inserted in- 
to wine jars or amphorse, 
and the cavity filled with 
that liquid precisely as in 
the sprinkling pot, and 
samples then withdrawn 
by closing the small ori- 
fice with the finger as in the modern instrument, which is shewn at No 
76, and as in the dropping tube, one form of which is figured at No. 77. 
The general form of No. 72 assimilates it to those drinking vessels of the 
ancients, which they held at a distance in front, and directed the stream 
issuing from the small end of the vessel into the mouth ; a mode still 
practised in some parts of the Mediterranean, and by the natives of Ceylon, 
Sumatra, Malabar, &c. 

One of the most singular facts connected with the religious institutions 
of the ancient heathen, was the extent to which they carried the practice 
of sprinkling : almost every thing was thus purified ; men, animals, trees, 
water, houses, food, clothing, carriages, &c. In performing the ceremony 
various implements were used to disperse the sacred liquid. A wisp 
made of horse hair attached to a handle was common. A branch from 
certain trees, and sometimes a small broom, were used ; in other cases 
perforated vessels were employed. Thus the Braminsin some ceremonies 
take a vessel of water, and after presenting it to the gods, they sprinkle 
the liquid with manguier leaves, on carriages, animals, &c. in others it is 
" sprinkled through a cullender with a hundred holes on the head of 
the father, mother and child."* The priests of the ancient Scandinavians 
also used a vessel " prepared like a watering pot, with which they 
sprinkled the altars, the pedestals of their gods, and also the men." b The 

a Sonnerat's Voyages. Vol. i, 134 and Vol. ii, 97. b Snorro's History of Scandinavia 
The chapter upon sacrifices is translated in Anderson's '' Bee,' vol. xvi, p. 20, Edin 
burgh, 1793. 




No. 72. 



No. 71. Sprinkler and Wine-taster both from Pompeii. 



196 Sprinkling Vessel Jrom Montfaucon. [Book IT. 

Jewish priests commonly used a branch of hyssop, but occasionally a 
piece of wool, and sometimes the fingers. "The priest shall dip his finger 
in the oil and sprinkle it." The Greeks and Romans had not only founts 
or vases of holy water in their temples for the use of worshippers, who 
dipped their fingers into them, as Roman catholics and others do at this 
day ; but on particular occasions, priests or officers attended to purify the 
people by sprinkling. Thus, when the Emperor Julian visited the temple 
at Antioch, the Neocori stood on each side of the doorway to purify with 
lustral water all who entered. Valentinian, who was afterwards raised to 
the empire, was then captain of Julian's guard, and as such walked in 
front. He was then a christian, and some of the water having been 
thrown upon him, he turned and struck the priest, saying, that the water 
rather polluted than purified ; at which the emperor was so enraged that 
he immediately banished him. 

Now whether the fingers or light brooms, &c. were used on such occa- 
sions we do not know ; but there were others at which the former cer- 
tainly were not. When the emperors dined, not only their persons and 
table furniture, but the food also was purified with lustral water. At the 
feast of Daphne near Antioch, which lasted seven days, we learn that 
a neochorus stood by the emperor's seat, and sprinkled the dishes and 
meats *■ as usual.' How was this water dispersed 1 Certainly not by the 
fingers ; nor is it likely that a wisp or a broom was employed, since it 
would be difficult to direct the small shower with sufficient precision on the 
smaller objects. We have made these remarks for the purpose of intro- 
ducing the figure of an ancient sprinkling ves- 
sel, from the third volume of Montfaucon's 
Antiquities. It was supposed by him to have 
belonged to the table or kitchen, but its spe- 
cific use he could not conjecture. It is evi- 
dently a modification of the atmospheric gar- 
den pot, and it appears admirably adapted for 
No. 73. Roman Sprinkling Vase, dispersing liquid perfumes or lustral water at 
the table. The ring is adapted to receive the 
forefinger, while the thumb could close the small orifice, and thus the con- 
tents might be retained or discharged at pleasure. 

Among other heathen customs that were long retained in the christian 
church, was this practice of sprinkling. Peter Martyr exclaims against a 
certain class, " who not only consecrate temples themselves, but also altars 
and coverings to the altars ; T meane the table clothes and napkins, and 
also the chalices and patins, the massing garmentes, the churchyardes, the 
waxe candles, the frankincense, the pascal lambe, eggs, and also holie wa- 
ter; the boughes of their palm trees, yong springes, grass, pot-hearbes, 
and finally all kinds of fruites." " They doe sprinkle houses, deade bodies, 
churchyardes, eggs, flesh, pothearbes, and garmentes." a 

Of all the transactions connected with heathen theology, few ever 
made a greater noise in ancient Rome than one that is connected with this 
part of our subject; viz. the miracle by which Tutia the vestal saved her 
life. It was a religious custom among all the nations of old, to keep sa- 
cred fire in the temples of their deities. In some, lamps were kept burning, 
in others fuel kindled on the altars. In the temples of Jupiter-Am- 
mon, Apollo, Minerva, and some other deities were lamps constantly 
burning. The Israelites were to cause the lamps to " burn continually," 
besides which, "the fire shall ever be burning upon the altar : it shall 




a Common Places, part iv, cap. 9. 



Chap. 3.] Vestals. 197 

never go out." Levit. vi, 13. The practice is still kept up by the Jews 
and also by Roman catholics. The origin of the custom is unknown ; but 
the Jews, Persians, Greeks, &c. are generally supposed to have derived it 
from the Egyptians. Upon the consecration of a temple, this ' holy fire* 
was not obtained from ordinary sources, i. e. from other fires, but was pro- 
duced by the rubbing of two sticks together ; or, according to Plutarch, 
was drawn directly from the sun. "If it happen (he observes in his Life 
of Numa) by any accident to be put out, as the sacred lamp is said to 
have been at Athens, under the tyranny of Aristion — at Delphi, when 
the temple was burned by the Medes — and at Rome in the Mithridatic, as 
also in the civil war, when not only the fire was extinguished but the 
altar itself overturned — it is not to be lighted again from another fire, but 
new fire is to be gained by drawing a pure and unpolluted flame from 
the beams of the sun. This is done generally with concave vessels of 
brass." 

Among the Romans a certain number of virgins were consecrated with 
solemn ceremonies to the Goddess Vesta. They were named vestals, 
and it was their peculiar duty to take charge of the sacred fire. They 
were greatly honored for their purity and the importance of their office. 
"What is there in Rome, (exclaimed Tiberius Gracchus in bis address to 
the people) so sacred and venerable as the vestal virgins who keep the 
perpetual fire V The most valuable and sacred deposites were often 
placed in their hands for security. The wills of rich Romans were 
sometimes committed to their care ; hence we read of Augustus 
forcing from them that of Antony, while the latter was in Egypt. The 
vestals enjoyed many privileges ; among others, when they went abroad, 
the fasces (emblems of authority) were carried by a lictor before them ; 
and it was death for any one to go under the litter or chair in which they 
were carried ; and if they met a criminal going to execution, his life was 
spared. The vestal daughter of Appius Claudius protected him from 
being arrested by the Tribunes. On the other hand, they were punished 
with extreme rigor if found to have broken any of their vows. To per- 
mit the perpetual or holy fire to go out was an unpardonable act, for it 
was believed to betoken some national calamity, and if one was found 
guilty of unchastity she was buried alive. " The criminal (says Plutarch) 
is carried to punishment through the forum in a litter, well covered with- 
out, and bound up in such a manner that her cries cannot be heard. The 
people silently make way for the litter and follow it with marks of ex- 
treme sorrow and dejection. There is no spectacle more dreadful than 
this, nor any day which the city spends in a more melancholy manner. 
When the litter comes to the place appointed the officers loose the cords, 
the high priest with hands lifted up towards heaven offers some private 
prayers just before the fatal minute; then takes out the prisoner, who is 
covered with a veil, and places her upon the steps which lead down into 
the cell, [grave ;] after this he retires with the rest of the priests, and when 
she is gone down, the steps are taken away and the cell is covered with 
earth, so that the place is made level with the rest of the mount." [Life 
of Numa, Langhorne's Trans.] 

Tutia, who was accused of incontinence, in order to avoid the horrid pen- 
alty, passionately called, or affected so to call, upon the goddess Vesta, 
to establish by a miracle her innocence. " Enable me (she cried) to take 
a sieve full of water from the Tyber, and to carry it full to thy temple." 
Upon this appeal her trial was stayed, and it was left to the deity she 
had invoked, to save her or not; for such a proof of the falsehood of her 
accusers could not, if it should take place, be resisted. The result 



198 



Tutia carrying Water in a Sieve. 



[Book II 




No. 74. Tutia carrying Wa- 
ter in a Sieve. 



was, she succeeded in carrying the water, and thereby not only saved her 
life, but greatly increased her reputation for sanctity. From the imper- 
fect accounts of the transaction that have reached 
us, it may perhaps be deemed presumptuous to 
decide on its real character. That it actually oc- 
curred there can be no doubt. It is incorporated 
with both the history and the arts of the Romans. 
It is mentioned by Valerius Maximus, by Pliny 
and Livy : representations of Tutia carrying the 
sieve were also embodied in sculptures, in statues, 
and engraved on gems. The annexed figure was 
copied from one of the latter. It is from the first 
volume of Montfaucon's Antiquities, Plate 28. 

As the feat therefore was certainly performed, 
it must have been either by natural or by superna- 
tural means. Some writers have admitted, and St. 
Augustine among them, that the miracle was a ge- 
nuine one ; but there are circumstances sufficient 
to show that the whole was a well conceived and 
neatly executed trick, on the part of Tutia and her 
friends; and further, that it -was a much more 
simple one, than other deceptions to which the heathen priests some- 
times had recourse. It possesses considerable interest however as fur- 
nishing another specimen of their proficiency in scientific juggling and 
natural magic. To say nothing of the absurdity of admitting a divine 
interposition, in answer to invocations addressed to a heathen goddess — 
and of the improbability of Tutia being condemned while innocent; there 
certainly was something suspicious in her undertaking to select the test for 
the goddess, and especially such a one as that of carrying water in a 
sieve. Instead of asking for a sign by water, it would nave been more 
appropriate and more natural in her (if sincere) to have prayed for one by 
fire — by that element which was the symbol of the deity she invoked, and 
which it was her peculiar duty to attend at the altar and preserve pure — 
the element too, which, if the accusation was true, she had polluted : be- 
sides, a token by fire was always considered by the heathen as the strong- 
est evidence of divine approbation. What prompted her then to mention 
the test of the sieve 1 Doubtless because the device by which it was to 
be performed was already matured; not by the assistance of Vesta, but 
by a very simple contrivance furnishe ( d her by the priests, from their stores 
of philosophical and other apparatus with which they wrought their won- 
ders before the people. 

The contrivance was, we presume, a modification 
of the ancient sprinkling pot, just described. The 
sieve she employed would therefore be a double 
one ; that is, its bottom and sides were hollow, the 
exterior bottom only being perforated, as in the anr 
nexed cut, which represents a double metallic vessel, 
the inner one being capable of holding water, and 
the upper edges of both united and made perfectly 
Na tion?fTu?i!i.tev'e. ruC "air tight, with the exception of one or perhaps two 
small openings shown on the edge in the figure. 
Thus when such a sieve was pressed slowly under water, the liquid would 
enter through the perforated bottom, drive the air before it, and fill the 
cavity ; and when the upper part was sunk below the surface, the upper or 
apparent sieve would also be filled. Then by covering the small opening 




Chap. 3.] Liquor Taster and Dropping Tube. 199 

with the thumb, the vessel might be raised out of the river, the water 
in the cavity being suspended precisely as in Nos. 69 and 70, so 
that Tutia might return with it to the temple, and on approaching the 
altar, by imperceptibly sliding her thumb to one side, the air would enter 
the opening thus exposed, and the contents of the cavity would descend 
in a shower, to the amazement of the spectators and to the confusion of 
her adversaries. With such an instrument she might go with that confi- 
dence to the trial, which she is represented to have felt, being fully con- 
vinced of success. While she was in the act of carrying the water, the 
spectators would be unable to detect the slightest imposition, or if, from 
the elevation at which she seems to have borne it, the bottom of the sieve 
was exposed, it would be more likely to confirm them in the belief of the 
miracle, as her movements would cause the suspended water to appear 
at the openings ; but it is more probable that they were kept at too great a 
distance by the managers of the farce, to afford them any opportunity of 
exercising an undue curiosity. And when the trial was over, the sieve 
would be secured by those in the secret, who would have one similar in 
appearance ready for examination whenever required. 

Few devices are better adapted to demonstrate the suspension of water 
by the atmosphere, than those little instruments which chemists and deal- 
ers in ardent spirit use, to examine their various liquids. Those of the 
former are named ' dropping tubes,' from the small quantities they are de- 
signed to take up, and the latter 'liquor tasters:' both are 
substantially the same, for they differ merely in form and di- 
mensions. Some curious experiments may be made with them. 
For example, a series of liquids similar in appearance but 
differing from each other in specific gravity, and such as do 
not readily mix, may be placed in a glass or other vessel, so 
as to form separate layers, the heaviest at the bottom, and the 
lightest reposing on the top. An expert manipulator may 
then by a taster (No. 76) withdraw a portion of each, and 
present to the examination of his audience from the same ves- 
L°i'qiorTa°ster' sel, samples of different wines, ardent spirits, water, &c. There 
? nd m u is reason to believe that the ancient professors of legerdemain 

Dropping Tube. , . , . , , , K T . - T -i i 

were well acquainted with such devices. It is possible that 
the trick performed by a Chinese juggler before the Russian embassy at 
Pekin, in the last century, was of the kind. It is thus described by Mr. 
Bell: " The roof of the room where we sat was supported by wooden 
pillars. The juggler took a gimblet, with which he bored one of the pil- 
lars and asked whether we chose red or white wine 1 The question being 
answered, he pulled out the gimblet and put a quill in the hole, through 
which ran as from a cask the wine demanded. After the same manner he 
extracted several sorts of liquors, all which I had the curiosity to taste, 
and found them good of the kinds." Bell's Travels. Lon. 1764, vol. ii, 28. 

Peter Martyr speaks of old jugglers that " devoure bread, and imme- 
diately spit out meale; and when they have droonke wine, they seem pres- 
entlie to poure the same out of the midst of their forehed." 

There are numerous intimations in history that hydrodynamics was one 
of the most fruitful sources of scientific imposture, to which ancient magi- 
cians had recourse. Besides the sieve of Tutia, the cup of Tantalus, and the 
Divining cup, there were "the marvellous fountain, which Pliny describes, 
in the island of Andros, which discharged wine for seven days and w T ater 
during the rest of the year — the spring of oil which broke out in Rome 
to welcome the return of Augustus from the Sicilian war — the three 
empty urns that filled themselves with wine at the annual feast of Bacchus, 




200 Divining Cups. [Book II 

in the city of Ellis — the glass tomb of Belus which was full of oil, and 
which when once emptied by Xerxes could not again be filled — the weep- 
ing statues, and the perpetual lamps ; — all the obvious effects of the equi- 
librium and pressure of fluids." 

The cup of Tantalus will be ound described in the Chapter on Si- 
phons in Book V. Divining cups may be noticed here, as there is reason 
to believe that water was suspended in some of them by atmospheric 
pressure; while in others, sounds were produced by the expulsion of 
air through secret cavities formed within them. Divination by water ha3 
prevailed from immemorial time, and. in the eastern world, has been prac- 
tised in a great variety of ways. Sometimes the inquirers into futurity 
performed the requisite ceremonies themselves, and with ordinary instru- 
ments, as when a mirror or looking-glass was used ; (see page 34) at 
other times professional sorcerers were employed. These men, as a mat- 
ter of course, provided their own apparatus, and hence had every oppor- 
tunity in its construction of concealing within some part, the device upon 
which their deceptions turned. 

Of all the implements connected with Hydromancy. cups are the most 
interesting. They are among the earliest that history has mentioned, 
(Genesis, xliv, 5,) and they have longer retained a place in the conjurer's 
budget than any other. They were used by astrologers of Europe during 
the middle ages, and are not yet wholly abandoned in that part of the 
world. Like all devices of the old magicians, ingenuity seems to have 
been exhausted in their formation and in adapting them to different spe- 
cies of jugglery. They were of various materials ; while some were of 
silver like Joseph's, others were of wood, glass, stone, &c. according to 
the nature of the trick to be performed by them. Sometimes presages 
were drawn from observing the liquid through the sides of the cup; for 
this purpose it was made of a translucent material ; but then one side was 
left thick while the others were thin, so that the contents were invisible 
through the former, but quite plain through the latter. The indications 
were considered favorable when the liquid was clear and distinctly seen, 
and unfavorable if the inquirer could not perceive it — thus either side 
was presented by the conjurer as best suited his views. The same trick 
is still performed in some of the churches in Italy ; one side of the goblet 
or glass is made opaque, while the other is transparent. With other cups 
it was the motion or agitation of the liquid that was looked for : if it re- 
mained at rest, the omen was bad — if violently moved, good. This kind 
of divination most likely depended on legerdemain or 'sleight of hand,' 
in dropping unperceived some substance into the vessel that produced ef- 
fervescence — or by opening a secret communication with a cavity in the 
stem or base of the vessel, containing a liquid that had a similar effect. In 
Japan it is common to place a pot of water on the head ; if the liquid 
boil over, the presage is good, "but if it stirs not, bad luck." a Among 
the prodigies mentioned by Herodotus, is one of this kind : the flesh of 
a victim sacrificed during the Olympic games, was placed in brazen caul- 
drons, and " the water boiled up and overflowed without the intervention 
of fire," (B. i, 59.) The emerald cup, by which the priests of Mentz 
deluded people in the dark ages, belongs to the same class. On certain 
days, two or three extremely minute fishes were secretly put in, and by 
their motions in the water produced such an effect that the people were 
persuaded "the cup was alive. " b 

a Montaims' Japan, translated by Ogilby, Lon. 1670, p. 123. 

b Misson's Travels, vol. i, 93. See also Moreri's Diet, vol, iv. Art. Augury. 



Chap. 4.J Impossible to raise Liquids by Suction. 201 

The divining cups of the Assyrians and Chaldeans appear, from im- 
perfect accounts of them extant, to have been more artificially contrived. 
When one was used, it was filled with water, a piece of silver or a jewel 
having certain characters engraved on it was thrown in ; the conjurer 
then muttered some words of adjuration, when the demon thus addressed, 
it is said, "whistled the answer from the bottom of the cup." These ves- 
sels were probably so contrived, that the water might compress air con- 
cealed in some cavity in the base, and force it through the orifice of a mi- 
nute reed or whistle, as in the musical bottles of Peru. As Julius Cyre- 
nius says such cups were also used by the Egyptians, it is possible that it 
was one of them by which Joseph divined, or affected through, policy to 
divine. Divination by the cup is still practiced in Japan. 

It is well known that the jugglers of Asia have always ^ been unri- 
valled. Even in modern times, some of their tricks are beautiful applica- 
tions of science, and are so neatly performed as to baffle the most saga- 
cious of observers. A full account of them would go far to explain all 
the miracles which ancient authors have mentioned, and would afford some 
curious information respecting the secrets of ancient temples. 



CHAP TER IV. 

Suction : Impossible to raise liquids by that which is so called— Action of the muscles of the thorai 
and abdomen in sucking explained — Two kinds of suction — Why the term is continued — Sucking poisoi 
from wounds — Cupping and cupping-horns — Ingenuity of a raven — Sucking tubes original atmospherie 
pumps — The Sanguisuchello — Peruvian mode of taking tea, by sucking it through tubes — Reflections on 
it. — New application of such tubes suggested — Explanation of an ambiguous proverbial expression. 

Air is expelled from such vessels as are figured in the last chapter by 
thrusting them into a liquid, which entering at the bottom, drives out as 
it rises the lighter fluid at the top. In the apparatus now to be described, 
it is withdrawn in a different manner. The vessels are not lowered into 
water, but the latter is forced up into them. The operation by which this 
is accomplished was formerly named suction, from an erroneous idea that 
it was effected by some power or faculty of the mouth, independently of 
any other influence. A simple experiment will convince any one that the 
smallest particle of liquid cannot be so raised : — fill a common flask or 
small bottle within a quarter of an inch of the top of the neck, and place 
it in a perpendicular position ; then let a person apply his mouth over the 
orifice, and he may suck forever without tasting the contents ; the veriest 
lover of ardent spirits would die in despair ere he could thus partake of 
his favorite liquor ; and the exhausted traveler could never moisten his 
parched throat, although the liquid, as in the case of Tantalus, was at 
nis lips. 

As remarked in a previous chapter, the error was not exploded till 
Torricelli and Pascal's experiments proved that water is not raised in 
pumps by suction, or any kind of attraction, but by pulsion from aerial 
pressure. Suction therefore, or that which was so called, merely removes 
an obstacle [air] to a liquid's ascent — it does not raise it, nor even aid in 
the act of raising it. In other words, it is simply that action of the mus- 
cles of the thorax and abdomen which enlarges the capacity of the lungs 

26 



<J02 Cupping and Cupping Instruments. [Book II. 

and chest, so that air within them becomes rarefied and consequently no 
longer in equilibrium with that without — hence when in this state a com- 
munication is opened between them and a liquid, the weight of the atmos- 
phere resting upon the latter necessarily drives it into the mouth ; as for 
example, when a person drinks water from a tumbler or tea from a cup. 
How singular that the rationale of taking liquids into the stomach was not 
understood till the 17th century — that so simple an operation and one in- 
cessantly occurring, should have remained unexplained through all pre- 



vious time 



Two kinds of suction have been mentioned by some writers, but the prin- 
ciple of both is the same : one, the action of the chest just mentioned — the 
other, that of the mouth alone ; viz. by lowering the under jaw while the 
lips are closed, and at the same time contracting and drawing the tongue 
back towards the throat. There is this difference between them : the 
former can be performed only in the intervals of respiration, while the 
latter may be continuous, since breathing can be kept up through the nos- 
trils. One has been named supping, the other sucking. The term ' sucker,' 
commonly applied to the piston of atmospheric pumps, arose from its 
acting as a substitute for the mouth. With this explanation of the terms 
suction, sucking, &c. we shall occasionally use them, in accordance with 
general custom, for want of substitutes equally popular. 

Infants and the young of all mammals not only practice sucking till they 
quit their mother's breasts for solid food, but most of them continue the 
practice through life when quenching their thirst : of this man is an ex- 
ample, for it is by sucking that we receive liquids into the stomach, 
whether we plunge our lips into a running stream, receive wine from 
a goblet, or soup from a spoon. As the origin of artificial devices 
for raising liquids by atmospheric pressure may be traced to this natural 
operation, some other examples may be mentioned. Of these, sucking 
poison from wounds is one. This has been practiced from unknown an- 
tiquity. Job, speaks of sucking the poison of asps — At the siege of Troy, 
Machaon ' suck'd forth the blood' from the wounds of Menelaus ; and the 
women among the ancient Germans were celebrated for thus healing their 
wounded sons and husbands. The serious consequences that often at- 
tended the custom, led at an early period to the introduction of tubes, by 
means of which the operation might be performed without danger to the 
operator; for scrofulous and other diseases were frequently communicated 
to the latter, by drawing tainted blood and humors into the mouth; whereas, 
by the interposition of a tube, the offensive matter could be prevented 
from coming in contact with the lips. 

Before the use of the lancet was discovered, these cupping tubes were 
applied in ordinary blood-letting. Even at the present day such is the 
only kind of phlebotomy practiced by the oldest of existing nations ; for 
"the name and the use of the lancet are equally unknown among the na- 
tives of Hindostan. They scarify the part with the point of a knife and 
apply to it a copper cupping-dish with a long tube affixed to it, by means 
of which they suck the blood with the mouth. " a It is the same with the 
Chinese, Malays, and other people of the east. These generally use the 
same kind of apparatus as the Hindoos, but sometimes natural tubes are 
employed, as a piece of bamboo. b The horns of animals, as those of 
oxen and goats were also much used ; these on account of their coni- 
cal form being better adapted for the purpose than cylindrical tubes 

a Shoberl's Hindostan, v, 42. b Chinese Repos. iv, 44. See also Le Comte's China, 
and Marsden's Sumatra. 



Chap. 4.] The Sanguisucliello. 203 

, Park found the negroes of Africa cupping with rams' horns ; and the 
Shetlanders continue to use the same instrument, having derived it from 
their Scandinavian ancestors. Cupping was practiced by Hippocrates, 
and cupping-instruments were the emblems of Greek and Roman phy- 
sicians. 

The application of a reed or other natural tube, through which to suck 
liquids that cannot otherwise be reached, has always been known. The 
device is one which in every age, boys as well as men acquire a know- 
ledge of intuitively, or as it were by instinct; nor does it indicate a greater 
degree of ingenuity than numerous contrivances of the lower animals — 
that of the raven for example, which Pliny has mentioned in the tenth 
book of his Natural History. This bird, during a severe drought, seeing 
a vase near a sepulchre, flew to it to drink, but the small quantity of 
water it contained was too low to be reached. In this dilemma, stimula- 
ted by want and thrown upon its own resources for invention, it soon de- 
vised an effectual mode of accomplishing its object — it picked up small 
pebbles and dropped them into the vessel till the water rose to the brim — 
an instance of sagacity fully equal to the application of a tube under 
similar circumstances by man. 

As sucking tubes are atmospheric pumps in embryo, a notice of some 
applications of them will form an appropriate introduction to the latter. 
They constituted part of the experimental apparatus of the old Greek Pie- 
nists and Vacuists; and were used by the Egyptians as siphons. They 
were, and still are, employed in Peru for drinking hot liquids, and 
were anciently used by the laity in partaking of wine in the Eucharist. 
"Beatus Rhenanus upon Tertullian in the booke De Corona Militis, re- 
porteth that among the riches and treasures of the church of Mense, were 
certain silver pypes by the which profane men, whom they call the laietie, 
sucked out of the challice in the holy supper." a The device, if not of 
more distant origin, was perhaps designed in the dark 
ages, as a check to the rude communicants, who would 
naturally be inclined to partake too freely of the cup. 
But since the laity were excluded by the Council of 
Constance, from sharing the wine, the use of such tubes 
has been retained. At the celebration of high mass at St. 
Denis, the deacon and sub-deacon suck wine out of the 
chalice by a chalumeau or tube of gold. [Diet, de Tre- 
voux. Art. Chalumeau.] 

'The sanguisucliello or blood-sucker,' says La Motraye, 
is a golden tube by which the Pope sucks up the blood 
[wine] at high mass; the chalice and tube being held 
by a deacon. The instrument, he remarks, corresponds 
with " the ancient pugillaris, or tube mentioned by Car- 
dinal Bona in his treatise of things belonging to the liturgy, 
and of the leavened and unleavened bread. " b No. 78 is a 
figure of the sanguisucliello. It has three pipes, but the 
middle or longest one is that by which the liquid is raised. 
The whole is of gold, highly ornamented, and enriched 
Sanguisucliello. with a large emerald. One reason assigned for its use, 
is, that it is more seemly to suck the blood [wine] as 
through a vein, than to sup it. 

The Peruvians make a tea or decoction of the 'herb of Paraguay,' 




a Peter Martyr's Com. Places. Loii. 1583. Part 4, p. 37. b La Motraye's Trav, i. 
29, 31, 427, and Blainville's Trav. ii, 332. 



204 



Peruvian Sucking Tubes. 



[Book II 




No. 79. Peruvian female taking tea with 
a sucking-tube. 



which is common to all classes. "Instead of drinking the tincture or 
infusion apart, as we drink tea, they put the herb into a cup or bowl 
made of a calabash or gourd, tipp'd with silver, which they call mate; 

they add sugar and pour on it the hot 
water, which they drink immediately 
without giving it time to infuse, because 
it turns as black as ink. To avoid drink- 
ing the herb which swims at the top, 
they make use of a silver pipe, at the 
end whereof is a bowl full of little 
holes; so that the liquor suck'd in at 
the other end is clear from the herb." a 
Frezier has given an engraving of a 
lady thus employed, from which the 
annexed cut is copied. 

In Frezier's time it was the custom 
for every one at a party to suck out 
of the same tube — like Indians in coun- 
cil, each taking a whiff from the same 
calumet. With the exception of con- 
fining a company to the use of one in- 
strument, we should think this mode 
of ' taking tea' deserving the considera- 
tion of the wealthy, since it possesses several advantages over the Chinese 
plan which we have adopted. In the first place, it is not only a more 
ingenious and scientific mode of raising the liquid, but also more graceful 
than the gross mechanical one of lifting the vessel with it. It is more 
economical as regards the exertion required ; for in ordinary cases a per- 
son expends an amount of force in carrying a cup of tea backwards and 
forwards, so many times to his mouth, as would suffice to raise a bucket 
of water from a moderately deep well. In the use of these tubes there is 
no chance of verifying the old proverb — ' many a slip between the cup 
and the lip' — And then there is no danger of breakage, since the vessel 
need not be removed from the table. How often has a valuable 'tea-set' 
been broken, and the heart of the fair owner almost with it, by some 
awkward visitor dropping a cup and saucer on their way to his mouth, 
or on their return to the table ! Lastly, the introduction of these tubes, 
would leave the same room as at present for display in tea-table para- 
phernalia. 

There is another application of them which some convivialists may 
thank us for suggesting. It has been regretted by ancient and modern 
epicures that nature has given them necks much shorter than those of 
some other animals; these philosophers supposing that the pleasures of 
eating and drinking are proportioned to the length of the channel through 
which food passes to the stomach. Now although a sucking tube will not 
alter the natural dimensions of a person's neck, it may be so used as to 
prolong the sensation of deglutition in the shortest one; for by contracting 
the orifice, each drop of liquid imbibed through it may be brought in 
contact with the organs of taste, and be detained in its passage until every 
particle of pleasure is extracted from it; — being the reverse of what 
takes place, when gentlemen swallow their wine in gulps. The most fas- 
tidious disciple of Epicurus could not object to this use of them, since 
nothing would touch his liquid but the tube; and as every person would 



a Frezier's Voyage to the South Seas, p. 252. 



Ohap. 5.] Various forms of Pumps. 205 

provide his own, no one would ever think of borrowing his neighbor's, 
any more than he would ask for the loan of his tooth-pick. a 

We are not sure that this plan of attenuating agreeable liquids, did not 
give rise to that mode of drinking adopted by the luxurious Greeks and 
Romans, to which we have before alluded. Their drinking vessels were 
o-enerally horns, or were formed in imitation of them. At the small end 
of each a very minute opening was made, through which a stream of 
drops, as it were, descended into the mouth. Paintings found in Pom- 
peii, and other ancient monuments, represent individuals in the act of thus 
using them — while others, whose appetite for the beverage, or whose 
thirst was too keen to relish so slow a mode of allaying it, are seen 
drinking, not out of "the little end," but out of the large end "of the 
horn." We have mentioned this circumstance because it appears to af- 
ford a solution of an old, but somewhat ambiguous saying. 



CHAPTER V. 

On bellows pumps: Great variety in the forms and materials of machines to raise water — Simple bel 
lows pump — Ancient German pump — French pump — Gosset's frictionless pump : Subsequently re-in- 
vented — Martin's pump — Robison's bag pump — Disadvantages of bellows pumps — Natural pumps in 
men, quadrupeds, insects, birds, &c. — Reflections on them. Ancient vases figured in this chapter. 

In the course of time a new feature was given to sucking tubes, by 
which they were converted into pumps : this was an apparatus for with- 
drawing the air in place of the mouth and lungs. In what age it was first 
devised, and by what people, are alike unknown. The circumstance that 
originally led to it, was probably the extension of the length of sucking 
tubes, until the strength of the lungs was no longer sufficient to draw 
water through them. In this way the bellows pump, the oldest of all 
pumps, we presume took its rise. 

It should be borne in mind that an atmospheric pump is merely a con- 
trivance placed at the upper end of a pipe to remove the pressure of the 
atmosphere there, while it is left free to act on the liquid in which the 
lower end is immersed ; and farther, that it is immaterial what the sub- 
stance of the machine is, or what figure it is made to assume. Some per- 
sons perhaps may suppose that pumps seldom vary, and then but slightly, 
from the ordinary one in our streets, (the ancient wooden one) but no idea 
could be more erroneous; for few, if any, machines have undergone a 
greater number of metamorphoses. The body or working part, which is 
named the 'barrel' and sometimes the 'chamber,' so far from being always 
cylindrical, has been made square, triangular, and elliptical; — it is not even 
always straight, for it has been bent into a portion of a circle, the centre 
of which formed the fulcrum of the lever and rod, both of which in this 
case being made of one piece : its materials have not been confined to 
wood and the metals, for pumps have been made of glass, stoneware, 
stone, leather, canvas, and caoutchouc. Some have been constructed like 

a In Shakespeare's time, "every guest carried his own knife, which he occasionally 
whetted on a stone that hung behind the door. One of these whetstones may be seen 
in Parkinson's Museum. They were strangers at that period to the use of forks.' 
[Ritsons's Notes on Shakespeare's Timon of Athens. Act i, Scene 2.] 



206 



Bellows Pump. 



[Book II 




a bag, resembling the old powder-puff or the modern accordion; others in 
the form of the domestic and blacksmith's bellows — some in the figure 
of a drum, and others as a portion of one — as a simple horizontal tube 
suspended at the centre on a perpendicular one, and whirled round like 
the arms of a potter's wheel — then again as a perpendicular tube without 
sucker or piston, and moved like a gentleman's walking cane, from which 
maeed its name is derived. (See Canne Hydraulique in Book IV.) They 
have also been made of two simple tubes, one moved over the other like 
those of a telescope — even a kettle or cauldron has been used as a pump, 
and the vapor of its boiling water substituted for the sucker to expel the 
air it contained, after which the pressure of the at- 
mosphere forced water into it from below. In fine, 
any device by which air can be removed from the 
interior of a vessel, is, or may be used as a pump to 
raise water. 

Nor have the 'suckers' or 'pistons' been subject 
to less changes than other parts of pumps. They 
have been made solid and hollow — in the form of 
cones, cylinders, pyramids, sectors, and segments of 
circles: — in the shape of cog-wheels, and of the 
arms and vanes of wind-mills, with motions analogous 
to such as these; and sometimes they are made in 
the shape of a gentleman's hat and of similar mate- 
rials; while the only motion imparted to them, is 
the odd one of alternately pushing them inside out 
and outside in. 

If a collapsed bladder or leather bag, be secured 
at its orifice to the upper end of a perpendicular 
tube whose lower end is placed in a vessel of water, 
(No. 80) then, if by some contrivance the bag can be distended, as shown 
by the dotted lines, the small quantity of air contained in it and the pipe 
would become rarefied, and consequently unable 
to balance the pressure without — hence the liquid 
would be forced up into the bag, until the air within 
became again condensed as before — that is, the blad- 
der would be filled with water, with the exception 
of a quantity equal to the space previously occupied 
by the air within it and the pipe. 

To convert this simple apparatus into a pump, two 
valves or clacks only are wanting. One, opening up- 
wards and placed in any part of the pipe or at either 
of its extremities. This will allow water to pass up 
through it, but none to descend. The other placed 
over an aperture made on the top of the bag, and 
opening outwards — through this the contents of the 
vessel when collapsed can be discharged; and when 
distended it will close, and thereby prevent the en- 
trance of the external air. The instrument thus ar- 
anged becomes a bellows pump, (No. 81,) a machine, 
which from the obvious application of the bellows to 
raise and spout water as well as air, has been re- 
invented by machinists in almost every age. 
No. jiiows Pump. The figure scarcely requires illustration. It repre 

sents a pipe attached to the under board of a circular 
or lantern bellows, the orifice of which is covered by a clack — the upper 



No. 80. 




Chap. 5.] 



Old German Bellows Pump. 



207 



board has also an opening in its centre which is closed by a valve or clack, 
and also famished with a rod and handle. The under board ^ sometimes 
forms the bottom of a box, in one side of which a spout is inserted, as 
shown by the dotted lines. 

The earliest representation of a bellows pump which we have met 
with in books, is among the curious cuts attached to the first German 
translation of Vegetius, from which No. 82 is copied. (Erffurt 1511) a It 
will suffice to show the application of this kind of pump to raise water 
at that time. There was of course a valve covering the interior orifice 
of the nozzle and opening outwards, to prevent the air from entering 
when the upper board was raised. This valve is not shown because the 
art of representing the interior of machines by section, was not then un- 
derstood, or not practiced. The lower board is fastened to the ground by 
a post and key, and a weight is placed on the upper one to assist in ex- 
pelling the water. 




No. 82. German Atmospheric Bellows Pump. A. D. 1511. 

One hundred years ago, two bellows fixed in a box and worked by a 
double lever, like the old fire or garden engine, was devised by M. Da 
Puy, Master of Requests to the king of France. The machine was re- 
commended to raise water from the holds of ships, drain lands, &c. It 
appears that the widow of M. Du Puy, expected to reap great advantages 
from it in England; but Dr. Desaguliers, in 1744, published a description 
of it taken from the French account, and among other remarks he ob- 
served — "About fourteen years ago, two men here applied for a patent 
for this very engine, proposing thereby to drain mines ;" * * * " all the 
difference was, that their bellows were fixed upon a little waggon; and 
they had a short sucking pipe under; and the force pipe went up from 
the two bellows. I opposed the taking out of this patent, because I 
thought it would be of great hurt to the undertakers, to lay out near 
eighty pounds for what would never bring them eighty pence ; unless they 
made a bubble of it, and drew unwary people into a scheme to subscribe 
money." (Ex. Philos. ii, 501.) Bellows pumps were previously used in 
France. They are spoken of as common in the old Diet, de Trevoux. 

a I am indebted to John Allan, Esq. for a copy of this scarce old work. It is the same 
to which Prof. Beckman refers in his article on the diving bell. Unfortunately the cuts 
are left without explanation. 



208 



Gosset and DeuilWs Pump. 



[Book II. 




No. 83. Gosset and Deuille's Pump. 



A neat and perhaps the best modification of these machines was de 
vised about the year 1732, in Paris, by Messrs. Gosset and Deuille. It was 
described by Belidor in 1739, and by Desaguliers in 1744, as "a piston 
without friction." It consists of a circular piece of leather pressed into 

the form of a deep dish, or of a low 
crowned hat with a wide rim. This 
rim is secured by bolts and screws 
between two flanches of a pump cy- 
linder, forming an air tight joint — the 
part corresponding to the body of the 
hat fits loosely into the cylinder ; and 
the crown is strengthed by a circular 
plate of metal of the same size and 
riveted to it. In the centre of this 
plate an opening is made and also 
through the leather for the passage 
of the water, and covered by a valve 
opening upwards like the ordinary 
sucker of a pump. The forked end 
of the pump-rod is secured to this 
plate. (See figure.) When the rod is 
raised, the bottom of the dish or hat 
is above the flanch, and when down 
it is pushed inside out as shown in 
the cut. Thus, by alternately ele- 
vating and depressing it, the water is raised as in the common pump. 
This piston is described in Vol. VI, of Machines approved by the French 
Academy for 1732, p. 85, as the invention of M. Boulogne. 

The great advantage of this pump is in the sucker or piston not rub- 
bing against or even touching the sides of the cylinder, hence there is no 
friction to overcome from that source, and the leather is consequently 
more durable ; but the length of stroke is much less than in common 
pumps, it seldom exceeding six or eight inches, lest the leather should be 
overstrained in pressing it deeper. Large pumps of this description were 
worked in the mines of Brittany incessantly during three or four months 
without requiring any repair. India-rubber, and canvas saturated or 
coated with it, have been successfully used in place of leather. Some 
modifications of the sucker have also been introduced. 

This pump was re-invented in England some years ago, and made con- 
siderable noise under a new name. See London Mechan. Magazine, and 
Register of Arts, 1826-29 ; also the Journal of the Franklin Institute for 
1831, vol. vii, 193. In 1766, Mr. Benjamin Martin, the well known au- 
thor of ' Philosophia Britannica' and other scientific works, proposed a good 
double pump of this kind for the British navy — a figure and description 
of it may be seen in Vol. XX. of Tilloch's Philosophical Magazine. 

Dr. Robison, in the second volume of his Mechanical Philosophy, pro- 
posed what has been named an improvement on the last pump. His de- 
vice is however little else than the old bellows pump. A figure of it and 
his description are annexed. 

A, B, (No. 84) represents a wooden trunk or cylinder of metal, having a 
a spout at the upper part, and the lower end closed by a plate, the opening 
in which is covered by a clack valve E, as in No. 83. To this plate is se- 
cured the open bottom of a long cylindrical bag, the upper end being fixed 
to the round board F. " This bag may be made of leather or of double can- 
vas, a fold of thin leather or of sheepskin being placed between the two 



Chap. 5.] 



Bag Pump. 



209 




No. 84. Bag Pump. 



folds. The upper end of the bag should be firmly tied with a cord in a groove 

turned out of the rim of the board at F. Into 
this board is fixed the fork of the piston rod, 
and the bag is kept distended by a number of 
wooden hoops or rings of wire, fixed to it 
at a few inches distance from one another, and 
kept at the same distance by three or four 
cords binding them together, and stretching 
from the top to the bottom of the bag. Now 
let this trunk be immersed in the water : it 
is evident that if the bag be stretched from 
the compressed form which its own weight 
will give it by drawing up the piston rod, its 
capacity will be enlarged, the valve F will 
be shut by its own weight, the air in the bag 
will be rarefied, and the atmosphere will 
press the water into the bag. When the rod 
is thrust down again, the water will come out 
at the valve F, and fill part of the trunk. A 
repetition of the operation will have a similar 
effect; the trunk will be filled, and the water will at last be discharged 
at the spout." The operation is precisely the same as in No. 81. 

"Here is a pump without friction and perfectly tight; for the leather 
between the folds of canvas renders the bag impervious both to air and 
water. We know from experiment that a bag of six inches diameter 
made of sail cloth No. 3, with a sheepskin between, will bear a column 
of fifteen feet of water, and stand six hours work per day for a month, 
without failure; and that the pump is considerably superior in effect to a 
common pump of the same dimensions. We must only observe that the 
length of the bag must be three times the intended length of the stroke, 
so that when the piston rod is in its highest position, the angles or ridges 
of the bag may be pretty acute. If the bag be more stretched than this, 
the force which must be exerted by the laborer becomes much greater 
than the weight of the column of water which he is raisin o-." 

But after all that can be said in favor of bellows pumps, they have their 
disadvantages. A prominent one is this : when the leather or other ma- 
terial of which they are formed is worn out, a practical workman, who 
is not to be obtained in every place, is required to renew it. Unlike re- 
placing the leather on an ordinary ' sucker', which a farmer or a sailor on 
ship-board can easily accomplish, the operation requires practice to per- 
form it efficiently, and the expense both of time and materials is much 
greater than that of similar repairs to the common pump. For these and 
other reasons, bellows pumps have never secured a permanent place 
among staple machines for raising water, and the old cylindrical pump 
still retains the preeminence, notwithstanding the almost innumerable pro- 
jects that have been brought forward to supersede it. 

The preceding machines resemble in some degree the apparatus for 
drinking which the Creator has furnished to us and to such quadrupeds 
as do not lap. When an ox or a horse plunges his mouth into a stream, 
he dilates his chest and the atmosphere forces the liquid up into his sto- 
mach precisely as up the pipe of a pump. It is indeed in imitation of 
these natural pumps that water is raised in artificial ones. The thorax is 
the pump; the muscular energy of the animal, the power that works it; 
the throat is the pipe, the lower orifice of which is the mouth, and which 
he must necessarily insert into the liquid he thus pumps into his stomach j 

27 



210 'Natural "Pumps. [Book II. 

and whenever the depth of water is insufficient to cover the opening be- 
tween his lips, the animal instinctively draws closer those portions of them 
above it, and contracts the orifice below, just as we do under similar cir- 
cumstances, and which we constantly practice in sipping tea or coffee from 
a cup, or any other beverage of which we wish to partake in small quan- 
tities. The capacious chest of the tall camel, or of the still taller came- 
leopard or giraffe, whose head sometimes moves twenty feet from the 
ground, is a large bellows pump which raises water through the long 
channel or pipe in his neck. The elephant by a similar pneumatic appa- 
ratus, elevates the liquid through that flexible 'suction pipe,' his proboscis; 
and those nimble engineers, the common house-flies, raise it through their 
minikin trunks in like manner. 

We may here remark, that among the gigantic animals which in remote 
ages roamed over this planet, and which quenched their thirst as the ox 
does, there could have been none which stood so high as to have their 
stomachs thirty feet above the water they thus raised into them. And on 
the table lands of Mexico, and the still higher regions of Asia, Africa, and 
South America, animals of this kind, if such there were, must have had 
their stomachs placed still lower. 

The mandibles of some insects are hollow, and are used as sucking 
pumps. They serve also sometimes as sheaths to poniards, with which 
nature has furnished them, as weapons of offence and defence. Those 
of the lion-ant are pierced, and "no doubt act as suckers." This little 
animal constructs a minute funnel-shaped excavation in dry sand, and co- 
vering its body at the bottom lays in wait, like an assassin, for its prey : 
"no sooner does an industrious ant, laden perhaps with its provision, ap- 
proach the edge of the slope, than the finelv poised sand gives way, and 
the entrapped victim rolling to the bottom, is instantly seized and sucked 
to a shadow by the lurking tyrant, who, soon after by a jerk of his head 
tosses out the dead body." Weasels and other animals suck the blood 
of their prey. The tortoise drinks by suction, for which purpose he 
plunges his head deep into the fluid, so as even to cover his eyes. There 
are several species of birds denominated 'suctorial' on account of their 
obtaining food by means of atmospheric pressure, which they bring into 
action by apparatus analogous to the pump. The grallatores or waders, 
"suck up their food" out of water. 

It is impossible to contemplate the structure and habits of animals, 
without being surprised at the extent to which this principle of raising li- 
quids has been adopted by the Almighty in the formation of insects, rep- 
tiles, fishes, birds, amphibia and land animals ; and also at its adaptation 
to their various forms, natures, and pursuits. Had we the necessary 
knowledge of their physiology, we would desire no greater pleasure, no 
other employment than to examine and describe these natural pneumatic 
machines, and the diversified modes of their operation. 

For other natural pumps, see remarks at the end of Chapter 2, on bel- 
lows forcing pumps, in the next Book. 

The vessels or vases figured in this chapter are ancient. Those in 
which the tubes are inserted in illustrations Nos. 80 and 81, are of glass; 
the one under the pump spout in No. 83, is a bronze bucket; all from 
Pompeii. The latter is referred to at page 67. The globular vessel in 
No. 84, is a figure of a brazen cauldron, also Roman, from Misson. See 
page 19 of this volume. 



Ohap. 6.1 The Common Atmospheric Pump. 213 



CHAP TE R VI. 

The atmospheric pump supposed by some persons to be of modern origin — Injustice towards the an 
cients — Their knowledge of hydrodynamics — Absurdity of an alledged proof of their ignorance of 
a simple principle of hydrostatics — Common cylindrical pump — Its antiquity — Anciently known un 
der the name of a siphon — The antlia of the Greeks — Used as a ship pump by the Romans — Bilge 
pump — Portable pumps — Wooden pumps always used in ships — Description of some in the U. S. Navy 
— Ingenuity of .sailors — Singular mode of making wooden pumps, from Dampier — Old draining pump — 
Pumps in public and private wells — In mines — Pump from Agricola, with figures of various boxes — 
Double pump formerly used in the mines of Germany, from Fludd's works — The wooden pump not im 
proved by the moderns — Its use confined chiefly to civilized states. 

Some persons are unwilling to admit that the atmospheric pump was 
known to the ancients, and yet they are unable to prove its origin in later 
times or by more recent people. The passages in ancient authors in which 
it is supposed to be mentioned or alluded to, are deemed inconclusive, 
because the terms by which it is designated were also applied to othei 
devices. 

To confine the knowledge of the ancients to such departments of the 
arts as are either expressly mentioned or referred to in Greek and Roman 
authors, and to those, specimens of which have been preserved to our 
times, is neither liberal nor just. Let us suppose Europe and the United 
States, in the course of future time, thrown back into barbarism, and all 
records perished, save a few fragments of the works of our dramatists, 
poets and historians ; — and that after the lapse of some 1500 or 2500 
years these should be discovered — and also some relics of our archi- 
tecture, pottery, and works in the metals : Now we should think the 
writers of those days illiberal in the extreme, who should conclude that 
we were ignorant of nearly all branches of science and of the arts ; and 
of every machine which was not particularly mentioned or illustrated in 
the former — or of which specimens were not found among the latter. 
And yet something like this, has been the treatment which the ancients 
have received at our hands. 

It cannot however be denied, that remains of their works still extant, 
exhibit a degree of skill in architecture, sculpture, metallurgy, pottery, en- 
graving, &c. which excels that of modern artists.* And as regards their 
knowledge of hydrodynamics — let it be remembered, that we are in- 
debted to them for canals, aqueducts, fountains, jets d'eau, syringes, for- 
cing pumps, siphons, valves, air vessels, cocks, pipes of stone, earthen- 
ware, wood, of lead and copper : yet notwithstanding all these, and their 
numerous machines for raising and transferring water, and the immense 
quantities of tubes for conveying it, which are found scattered over all 
Asia as well as Italy b and Greece, it has been gravely asserted, that they 
were ignorant of one of the elementary and most obvious principles of 

a It was remarked by the late Mr. Wedgewood, who was doubtless the most skilful 
manufacturer of porcelain in our own times, that the famous Barbarini Vase afforded 
evidence of an art of pottery among the ancients of which we are as yet ignorant, 
even of the rudiments. Edin. Encyc. vol. ii, 203. 

b The vast quantities of leaden pipes found at Pompeii induced the Neapolitan go- 
vernment to sell them as old metal. Pompeii, vol. i, 104. 



212 The Antlia, [Book II. 

hydrostatics : viz. that by which water in open tubes finds its own level • 
a fact, of which it may safely be asserted, it was impossible for them not 
to have known — a fact with which the Indians of Peru and Mexico were 
familiar; and one expressly mentioned by Pliny : " water, (he observes) 
always ascends of itself at the delivery to the height of the head from 
whence it gave receipt — if it be fetched a long way, the work [pipe] will 
rise and fall many times, but the level [of the water] is still maintained." 
Besides the testimony of Pliny, fountains and jets d'eau are incontro- 
vertible proofs that a knowledge of the fact is of stupendous antiquity ; 
they having been used in the east from immemorial ages. 

But the proof adduced to establish their ignorance in this particular, is 
as singular as the position it is brought forward to sustain, since it equally 
establishes our own ignorance of the same principle ! It has been said, 
had the ancients known that water finds its level at both extremities of a 
crooked tube, they would have conveyed it through pipes to supply their 
cities, instead of erecting those expensive aqueducts which were among 
the wonders of the world, and remains of which still strike the be- 
holder with admiration: — in reply to this it need only be observed, that 
should any remains of the Croton aqueduct, now constructing to supply 
this city (New- York) with water, be found two thousand years hence, 
they may, by the same argument, be adduced as proofs that the present 
engineers of the United States were ignorant that water poured into an 
inverted siphon would stand at the same level in both its branches. 

The fact is, the ancients did sometimes convey water over eminences in 
siphons of an easy curvature.* And aqueducts were in some few instan- 
ces carried through valleys by inverted siphons. In the reign of Claudius, 
an aqueduct was formed to convey water from Fourvieres to the highest 
part of the city of Lyons. As valleys of great depth were in the line of 
its course, works of an enormous expense would have been required, 
which might have prevented the execution of the project ; consequently, 
instead of an elevated canal, leaden pipes were substituted, forming an 
inverted siphon. b 

It is uncertain when or by whom the common atmospheric pump was 
invented. It is supposed to have been known to the old Egyptians, and 
to have been used in the ship in which Danaus and his companions sailed 
to Greece. As the antlia of the Greeks, it could not have originated 
with Ctesibius, to whom it has sometimes been attributed, since it or some 
other machine or device is mentioned under that name, by Aristophanes 
and ether writers who flourished ages before him. d There are other in- 
dications that it was previously known, for either it or something very 
like it is mentioned under the name of a siphon. This term it is known 
was a generic one, being applied to hollow vessels, as funnels, cullenders, 
pipes ; and generally to instruments that either raised or dispersed water, 
as syringes, catheters, fire-engines, sprinkling-pots, &c. e That the ma- 
chine to which we refer raised water by ' suction,' is apparent from an- 
cient allusions to it. According to Bockler, "the Platonic philosophers 
asserted that the soul should partake of the joys of heaven as through a 
siphon;" and by it Theophrastus explained the ascent of marrow in 
bones; and Columella the rise of sap in trees. In these instances, it is 
obvious that neither the ordinary siphon nor the syringe could be intended, 
but the atmospheric pump ; a machine that Agricola described as a 

a Foribroke's Encyc. Antiq. i, 41. b Hydraulia, Lon. 1835, p. 254. c See Edin. 
Encyc. Art. Chronology, vol. vi, 263. d Robinson's Antiquities of Greece, cap.4 On 
Military Affairs. e See Ainsworth's Diet. 



Chap. 6.J An Atmospheric Pump. 213 

siphon ; and one to which the remark of Switzer only can apply — " the si- 
,r>hon was undoubtedly the chief instrument known in the first ages of the 
world, (besides the draw-well) for the raisin. g of water." a 

Nor is there any thing in the account given by Vitruvius of 'the Ma- 
chine of Ctesibius,' which indicates that the atmospheric pump was not in 
previous use. His description is obviously that of a forcing pump, (and 
appears to have been so understood by all his translators,) one whose 
working parts were placed not above but in the water it was employed 
to elevate ; whose piston was solid, and which by means of pipes forced 
the water above itself; that raised the water "very high;" — attributes 
which do not belong to the common pump. It is true he has not men- 
tioned the latter, perhaps because it was not then employed as now in 
civil engineering, and therefore not within the scope of his design in wri- 
ting his w T ork. The manner in which Pliny speaks of it, shows that it 
was an old device in his time, since it was one with which even country- 
people or farmers, (the last to adopt new and foreign inventions) were fa- 
miliar. In his 19th Book, 'On Gardens,' cap. 4, he observes: when a 
stream of water is not at hand, the plants should be watered from tanks 
or wells, the water of which may be drawn up by plain poles, hooks and 
buckets, by swapes or cranes, [windlass] "or by pumps and such like." 
And that these were no other than the old wooden pump of our streets 
and such as our farmers use, is obvious from a passage in his 16th Book, 
cap. 42, where speaking of the qualities and uses of different kinds of 
wood, he remarks, " pines, pitch trees and allars, are very good to make 
pumps and conduit pipes to convey water; and for these purposes their 
wood is bored hollow." 

Although sufficient time may be supposed to have elapsed from the age 
of Ctesibius to that of Pliny for the introduction of the atmospheric 
pump to the countrymen of the latter, (supposing it to have been invented 
by the former) we can hardly believe, if it were not of more remote 
origin, that it could even in that time have found its way into Roman 
farm-yards and gardens ; much less that it should have superseded, (as it 
appears to have done) every other device on board of their ships. New 
and foreign inventions were neither circulated so easily nor adopted so 
readily in ancient as in modern days ; and even now a long time would 
elapse before inventions of this kind would find their way through the 
world and longer before they became generally adopted. But had the 
pumps of which Pliny speaks been of recent introduction, he would cer- 
tainly have said so ; and had they been the ' water forcers' of Ctesibius, 
to which he alludes in his 7th Book, he could scarcely have avoided re- 
cording the fact. 

That the antlia was the atmospheric pump would also appear from its 
employment in ships. There is no reason to suppose that more than three 
kinds of marine pumps were ever in use — the chain pump, the screw, and 
the common pump. In the chapter on the former we have showm that it 
was not known or used by the Greeks and Romans. The screw w r as first 
adopted as a ship pump by Archimedes, (see page 133) and hence it 
would seem that the last only could be intended by more ancient as well 
as subsequent authors when speaking of the antlia : that it was so, anti- 
quarians generally admit. " The well, (says Fosbroke in his article on the 
vessels of the classical ancients) was emptied by the winding screw of 
Archimedes now in use ; but in other ships by the antlia or pump." It is 
of the latter that Pollux speaks, and to it Tacitus refers when mentioning 

a Hydrostatics, 294. 



214 The Bilge Pump. [Book II 

the Wreck of some vessels in which Germanicus and his legions sailed 
down the Amisia into the German ocean : " the billows broke over them 
with such violence, that all the pumps at work could not discharge the 
water." [B. ii, 23. Murphy's Translation.] 

Martial, the Roman poet, speaks of the antlia as a machine 'to draw up 
water;' according to Ainsworth, 'a pump.' Kircher figures and describes 
the old wooden pump as the antlia. [Mundus Subterraneus, torn, ii, 196.] 

The Romans appear to have employed it exclusively or nearly so in 
their navy; and even in that of the Greeks it is not probable that the 
screw was extensively adopted, on account of its not being so well adap- 
ted for ships as the other. Of this the former people seem to have been 
convinced ; they preferred the pump and all modern nations have con 
firmed their judgment. Had they used the screw to any extent it 
would have been continued in European vessels after the fall of the Em- 
pire, when most of their arts and customs were naturally and necessarily 
continued — their ship pumps as well as their ships. But as the atmos- 
pheric pump only has so come down, we infer that the machine now com- 
monly used to discharge water from the holds of our vessels is identical, 
or nearly so, with that employed by Roman sailors of old. 

The oldest modification of the ship pump appears to have been that 
formerly known as the ' bilge' or ' burr' pump ; and it was the simplest, 
for it had but one distinct valve, viz. 'the lower box,' as the one which 
retains the water in a pump is sometimes named. This pump kept its 
place in ships till the last century, and may yet occasionally be met with 
in those of Europe. It was often worked without a lever, but its pecu- 
liarity consisted principally in the construction of the piston or sucker. a 
It differed from the ordinary pump "in that it hath a staff, six, seven or 
eight foot long, with a bur of wood whereunto the leather is nailed, and 
this serves instead of a box ; so two men standing over the pump, thrust 
down this staff, to the middle whereof is fastened a rope for six, eight or 
ten to hale by, and so they pull it up and down." This account published 
nearly 200 years ago, might be sufficiently descriptive then, when the 
pump was in common use, but few persons could now realize from it a 
correct idea of the substitute for the ordinary sucker. It is however ra- 
ther more explanatory than the accounts given in later works. In some it 
has been described as "a long staff with a burr at the end to pump up the 
bilge water." Here the burr only is mentioned, not the leather, and the 
idea imparted is that of a solid piston, such as are used in forcing pumps. 

The sucker of the bilge pump consists of a hollow cone or truncated cone 
of strong leather, the base being equal in diameter to that of the pump 
chamber or cylinder. It is inverted and nailed to the lower end of the 
rod. The lower edge of the leather resting against the burr. When 
thrust down it collapses and permits the water to pass between it and the 
sides of the chamber, and when its motion is reversed, the weight of the 
liquid column above it, presses it out again. To prevent the cone from 
sagging, three strips of leather are se ved to its upper part at equal dis- 
tances from each other, and their other ends nailed to the rod. (See 
No. 85.) The action of this sucker is something like moving a parasol 
up and down in water ; the sides close as the rod descends and open 
when it rises. It is the simplest modification of the sucker known and 
probably the most ancient. It is figured by Agricola, {vide C in No. 88) but 



a This part of an atmospheric pump is sometimes named the sucker, the bucket, the 
upper box, the piston; — we shall generally use the first when speaking of the atmo- 
spheric pump ; and the last when referring to forcing pumps. 



Chap. 6.] 



Portable Pumps. 



215 



is not mentioned by Belidor, Switzer, Desaguliers or Hachette; nor has it 
been noticed by more recent writers, with the exception of Mr. Millino-- 
ton a and perhaps one or two others. It has long been known in some 
parts of the United States. We noticed it twenty years ago at New 
Rochelle, Westchester county, in this state, (New- York) and were in- 
formed by a pump maker there, that they "always had it." It is not 
however universally known, for in 1831 a patent was taken out for it. b 

There is another application of the 
burr pump in ships that is probably 
due to old navigators. We allude to 
the use of those portable instruments 
which, says an old author, "are made 
of reed, cane, or laten, [brass] that sea- 
men put down into their casks to pump 
up the drink, for they use no spick- 
ets." No. 85 represents one, with a 
separate view of the sucker, from an 
illustrated edition of Virgil, of the 16th 
century. They appear to be of con- 
siderable antiquity and were perhaps 
used for the same purpose by the an- 
cient sailors of Tyre and Carthage, 
Greece and Rome. No. 86 is a figure 
of the common liquor pump, derived 
from the former. It is from U Art du 
Distillateur, in ' Descriptions des Arts et 
Metiers' folio, Paris, 1761. The se- 
parate section of the lower part shows 
the 'boxes' to have been similar to 
those now often used. Another sucker 
is figured with a spherical valve ; a boy's marble, or a small ball of metal 
being placed loosely over the orifice, instead of a clack. It was at that 
time made both of tin plate and of copper as at present. One of these 
pumps is mentioned by Conrad Gesner, as constituting part of a portable 
Italian distillery, in the former part of the 16th century, at which period 
it seems to have been common. See a reference to it, page 218. 

Ship pumps seem to have been made of bored wooden logs since the 
days of the elder Pliny, and probably were so by both Greeks and Ro- 
mans long before his time. We learn that they were made by ship- 
wrights, i. e. by a certain class of them. c At the present day, every 
person knows that wooden pumps are oftener to be found in ships than 
any other : this has always been the case. It is to them only that refe- 
rence is made in the relations of early voyages. The vessels of Colum- 
bus, d Vasco de Grama and Magalhanes, were furnished with them; indeed 
no other kind appears to have been used by old European navigators. 
From the importance of efficient machines to raise water from ships, it 
may reasonably be supposed that if any nation had possession of a supe- 
rior one, it would soon have been adopted by the rest ; but there is not 
the slightest intimation of any difference between them. The pump in 
Spanish, Portuguese, English and French vessels, is spoken of as com- 
mon; as much so as the anchor or rudder: thus — when the Vitoria one 




No. 85. Sailors' 
Portable Pump. 



No. 86. Liquor 
Pump. 



a Epitome of Philosophy, Lon. 1823, p. 199. b Journal of the Franklin Insti 
state, vol. ix, 235. c Lardner's Arts of the Greeks and Romans, vol. i, 350. d Ir 
ring's Columbus, vol. ii, 127. 



^16 Pumps in American Ships. [Book II. 

of Magalhanes' fleet, put into St. Jago on her return in 1522, a boat was 
sent ashore for provisions, and "some negroes to assist in working the 
pumps, many of the ship's company being sick, and the leaks having in- 
creased.'^ In the account of Frobisher's third voyage in search of a 
north-west passage in 1578, the Anne Francis having run on a sunken 
rock, "they had above two thousand strokes together at the pumpe be 
fore they could make their shippe free of the water, so sore she was 
brused." b In the voyage of some English vessels to the north the fol- 
lowing year, one was nearly lost; "by mischance the shippe was bilged 
on the grapnell of the Pavos, [another vessel] whereby the company 
[owners] had sustained great losses, if the chiefest part of their goods 
had not been layde into the Pavos ; for notwithstanding their pumping 
with three pumpes, heaving out water with buckets and all the best shifts 
they could make, the shippe was halfe full of water ere the leake could 
be found and stopt." c In November 1599, two large Portuguese ships 
arrived at Terceira in distress, having been separated in a storm, during 
which they "were forced to use all their pumpes" to keep afloat. d Ta- 
vernier sailed in 1652, from the Persian Gulf to Maslipatan in a large 
ship belonging to the king of Golconda; — a storm arose and became so 
violent that the water " rowl'd in from stem to stern, and the mischief 
was that our pumpes were nought.'* Fortunately several bales of leather 
were on board, of which they made bags or buckets, "which being let 
down from the masts with pulleys through certain great holes which were 
cut in the deck, drew up a vast quantity of water." e 

Wooden pumps, with and without metallic cylinders and boxes, are still 
common in European and American ships of war. The latter with few 
exceptions have no other. A description of those on board the North Ca- 
rolina, a ship of the line, may possibly interest some readers. This ves- 
sel has six. They are large trees bored out and lined with lead. They 
reach from the surface of the main gun deck to the well, a distance of 
twenty-three feet. A brass cylinder, 2 feet 9 inches long and 9 inches 
bore, in which the piston works, is let into the upper part of each; 
The piston rods (of iron) pass through the centre of a guide piece, se- 
cured over every pump, and are thus kept from deviating from a perpen- 
dicular position. They are connected to the levers by slings as in the 
common brass lifting pump and some others. The levers are double, and 
shaped like those of fire-engines, staves of wood being slipped through 
the rings whenever the pumps are worked. Each lever works two pumps; 
and the length of stroke, or the distance through which the pistons move 
in the cylinders, is 14 inches. The pistons or upper boxes are of brass 
with butterfly valves; the band of leather round each is secured by 
screws, (in place of nails in the wooden box.) 

'Necessity is the mother of invention :' the truth of this proverb is often 
illustrated by seamen, especially as regards the raising of water. Nu- 
merous are the instances in which they have relieved themselves from 
situations so alarming as to paralyze the inventive faculties of most 
other men ; either by devices to work the ordinary pumps when 
their strength was exhausted, or in producing substitutes for them when 
worn out. A singular example of the latter is mentioned by Dampier, 
which may be of service to sailors. It is attributed to a people who are 
not remarkable for their contributions to the useful arts, and on that account 



a Burner's Voyages, vol. i, 112. b Hackluyt's Collection of Voyages, &c. Lon. 
1598, black letter, vol. iii, 88. c Ibid, vol. i, 421. d Astley's Collection of Voyages 
Lon. 1746, vol. i, 227. e Travels in India, Lon. 1678, p. 90. 



Chap. 6.] Various modes of working Ship Tumps. 217 

it would hardly be just to omit it.. In the course of Dampier's voyage 
round the world, while sailing (in 1687) along the west side of Minda- 
' nao, one of the Philippine Islands, he concluded to send the carpenters 
ashore to cut down some trees for a bowsprit and topmast. "And our 
pumps being faulty and not serviceable, they did cut a tree to make a 
pump. They first squared it, then sawed it in the middle, and then hol- 
lowed each side exactly. The two hollow sides were made big enough 
to contain a pump-box in the midst of them both, when they were joined 
together ; and it required their utmost skill to close them exactly to the 
making a tight cylinder for the pump-box, being unaccustomed to such 
work. We learned this way of pump-making from the Spaniards, who 
make their pumps that they use in their ships in the South Seas after this 
manner ; and I am confident that there are no better hand-pumps in the 
world than they have." (Dampier's Voyages, vol. i, 443.) In the ab- 
sence of tools to bore logs the device is an excellent one, and in some 
particulars such a pump would be superior to the common one. It is 
not so readily made as one of planks, but it is more durable. 

Various ingenious modes of working their pumps have been devised 
by seamen and others ; the power of the men has been applied as in the 
act of rowing — this plan by far the most efficient is adopted in the French 
navy. A rope crossed over a pulley and continued in opposite directions 
on a ship's deck, so that any number of men may be employed at the 
same time, has been extensively used in pumps with double suckers, as 
shown at No. 92. Ropes passed through blocks and connected to the 
brake of the common pump have also been worked in a similar way. 
Captain Leslie, in a voyage from Stockholm to this country, adopted the 
following plan, which in a heavy gale, may be very efficient : ' He fixed 
a spar aloft, one end of which was ten or twelve feet above the top of his 
pumps, and the other projected over the stern : to each end he fixed a 
block or pulley. He then fastened a rope to the pump rods, and after 
passing it through both pulleys along the spar, dropped it into the sea 
astern. To the rope he fastened a cask of 110 gallons measurement and 
containing about 60 gallons of water. This cask answered as a balance 
weight, and every motion of the ship from the roll of the sea made the 
machinery work. When the stern descended, or when a sea or any agi 
tation of the water raised the cask, the pump rods descended ; and the 
contrary motion of the ship raised the rods, when the water flowed out 
The ship was cleared out in four hours, and the exhausted crew were 
of course greatly relieved.' 

A ship pump made of such boards or plank, as are commonly found on 
board of large vessels, was devised by Mr. Perkins, for which he received 
a gold medal from the London Society of Arts. It is figured and described 
in the 38th volume of the Society's Transactions. 

The facility with which wooden pumps are made and repaired, the 
cheapness of their material, the little amount of friction from pistons 
working in them, and their general durability, have always rendered them 
more popular than others. Like many of our ordinary machines, they 
seem to have been silently borne down the stream of past ages to the 
15th and 16th centuries, when, by means of the printing press, they first 
emerge into notice in modern times. The earliest representation of one 
we have met with in print is in the German translation of Vegetius, on the 
same page with No. 82, the bellows pump : No. 87, on next page, is a copy. 
It is square, made of plank and apparently designed to drain a pond or 
marsh. The piston or sucker, which is separately represented, is cylin- 
drical and was perhaps intended to show a variation in the construction 

28 



218 



Pumps in the 16t7i Century. 



[Book IL 




No. 87. A. D. 1511. 



of that instrument. It has no valve or 
clack, but appears to be a modii cation of 
the one used in the old bilge pump, which 
was sometimes compared to a 'gunner's 
sponge.' 

There are numerous proofs in old au- 
thors, that pumps were common in wells in 
the 15th century, since they are mentioned 
in the early part of the following one, as 
things in ordinary. In 1546, they were 
used to some extent in those of London. 
In the 'Practice of the New and old Phi- 
sicke,' by Conrad Gesner, (who died in 
. 1565) translated by George Baker, * one of 
the Queene's maiesties chiefe chirurgians in 
ordinary,' and dedicated to Elizabeth, (Lon. 
black letter, 1599,) is a description of a 
Florentine distilling apparatus, to which a 
portable pump was attached ; the latter is 
described as "an instrument which is so 
formed that the water by sucking is forced to rise up and run forth, as the 
like practice is often used in fits of water or welles." Folio 215. The cele- 
brated mathematician, necromancer, and alchymist, Dr. John Dee, who 
was frequently consulted by queen Elizabeth, had a pump in the well be- 
longing to his house. In Beroald's commentary on the 44th proposition of 
Besson, (the chain of pots) he observes that it "opere sans intermission en 
tirant l'eau de tout puits facilement sans pompes."* Sarpi, who first dis- 
covered the valves of the veins, compared them to those of a pump, 
'opening to let the blood pass, but shutting to prevent its return.' 

But pumps had not wholly, in the 16th century, superseded the old 
mode of raising water with buckets in European cities. At that time a 
great portion of the wells were open — of this, numberless intimations 
might be found. Thus in Italy, the poet Aurelli, who was made gover- 
nor of a city by Leo X. was murdered by the inhabitants on account of his 
tyranny, and his body with that of his mule thrown into a well. In Lon- 
don, it was not till the latter part of the following century that the chain 
and pulley disappeared. This is evident from the following enactment of 
the common council of that city the year after the great fire. (1667) "And 
for the effectual supplying the engines and squirts with water, pumps are 
to be placed in all wells :" b — a proof that many were open and the water 
raised in buckets. 

Pumps are also described in old works on husbandry, gardening, &c. 
from which it appears that they were often used to raise water for irriga- 
tion. In the 'Systema Agriculture, being the mystery of Husbandry 
discovered and laid open,' Lon. 1675, directions are given respecting va- 
rious modes of making and working them; and it is particularly di- 
rected that the rods be made of such a length as to permit the suckers or 
' upper boxes' to descend at every stroke below the surface of the water 
in the well ; this it is observed, ' saves much trouble.' The same remark 
accompanies an account of windmills for watering land [pumps driven 
by them] in the old 'Dictionarum Rusticum.' 

In the mines of Hungary pumps were early introduced, but at what 
period is uncertain. It is not improbable that those described by Agri- 



a Theatre des Instmraens, 1579. b Maitland's History of London, p. 297. 



Chap. 6.J 



Pumps in German Mines. 



219 




No. 88. 



Pump and Pistons from 
Agricola. 



cola, were similar to such as were used in some of the same mines by the 

ancients, and have always formed part of 
the machinery for discharging water from 
them since the fall of the Roman' empire. 
All that are figured in the De Re Metallica, 
are extremely simple, and with one excep- 
tion are atmospheric or sucking pumps. 
They are all of bored logs. Some are sin- 
gle pumps, and are worked by men with 
levers, cranks, and also by a kind of pendu- 
lum. Others are double, triple, &c, and 
worked by water wheels. Of the last some 
are arranged in rows, and the piston rods 
raised by cams as in a stamping mill; the 
weight of the rods carrying them down. 
Others are placed in tiers one above ano- 
ther; the lowest one raises the water from 
the bottom of the shaft or well, and dis- 
charges it into a reservoir at its upper end : 
into this reservoir the next pump is placed, 
which raises it into a higher one, and so on 
to the top. A pump of this kind from Ag- 
ricola, has been often republished. It was 
copied by Bockler and others. A figure of 
it is inserted in Gregory's Mechanics, Ja- 
mieson's Dictionary, &c. 

We have selected No. 88, as a specimen 
of a single pump, and of upper and lower 
boxes. A, A, represent two of the latter ; the upper part of one is tapered to 
fit it into the lower end of the pump log as is yet sometimes done. D, B, an 
upper box, of a kind occasionally used at the present time. The valve or 

clack is a disk laid loosely over 
the apertures, and is kept in its 
place by the rod, which passes 
through its centre and admits it 
to rise and fall. C, the conical 
sucker referred to, p. 214. 

The annexed figure of a 
double pump is from Fludd's 
works. It appears to have 
been sketched by him while in 
Germany, from one in actual 
use. It is represented as 
worked by a water wheel, 
that, by means of cog wheels 
transmitted motion to the hori- 
zontal shaft; the cams on which 
alternately depressed one end 
of the levers to which the pump 
rods were attached, and thus 
raised the latter. They de- 
scended by their own weight, 
as will appear from an inspec- 
tion of the figure. The separate view of a rod is intended to show the 
application of cranks on the horizontal shaft, in place of cams and le- 




No. 89. Double Pump in German mines. A. D. 1618. 



220 Tie Pump confined chiefly to civilized States, [Book IL 

vers. The lower ends of the pumps are inserted in baskets which act as 
strainers. A double series of pumps, (one over the other) as employed 
in a mine at Markirch in Germany, is also figured by Fludd. It is inte- 
resting- on account of the mode of communicating motion to the rods. A 
crank on the axle of a water wheel imparts motion to a walking beam, as 
in a steam engine; (in the latter the operation is reversed) and the pump 
rods are attached to both ends of the beam. a 

The idea may probably occur to the general reader, that the mechani 
cal talent and enterprise of the preceding and present century, which 
have produced so many original machines and scarcely left an ancient 
device unimproved, must have imparted to the old atmospheric pump new 
features, and made it capable of increased results. It is true that few de- 
vices have occupied a greater share of attention, and on none have more ef- 
forts to improve them been bestowed; but how far these have been suc- 
cessful may be inferred from the fact — that notwithstanding the endless 
variety of forms into which its working parts have been changed, and 
the great number of alledged improvements in suckers, pistons, valves, &c. 
the machine as made by the ancients, still generally prevails ; so that 
were some of their pump makers to reappear, and visit their fellow crafts- 
men throughout the world, they would find little difficulty in resuming 
their occupation. 

The pump, although a simple instrument, is confined chiefly to civilized 
states, while the extent to which it is employed, indicates pretty correctly 
the degree of refinement attained by the people who possess it. Whether 
it was known to the Egyptians under the Pharaohs or not, may be a 
question ; but when Egypt under the Greeks realized a partial revival of 
her former glory, the forcing pump we know made its appearance there; 
and under the second Ptolemy, when that country was a school for the 
rest of the world, its most valuable modifications were known. In suc- 
ceeding ages, the atmospheric pump has been a regular attendant on the 
revival of learning and of the arts. Wherever these have made the most 
progress, there the pump is mostly used. In Germany, France, Holland, 
Great Britain, and the United States, it is most extensively employed. In 
Spain, Portugal, Mexico and South America, but partially so. In Turkey, 
Egypt, Greece, &c. still less ; while in Asia and Africa, generally, it is un- 
known. 5 Egypt, even under the auspices of Mohammed Ali, is not yet pre- 
pare to receive it again. Its history in any country is that of the people. 
Take Russia for an example : of the devices for raising water there, we 
are informed the inhabitants use the swape, a rope passing over a pulley, 
(Nos. 13 and 14) a drum on which a rope is wound, (No. 23) horizontal 
and vertical wheels, and lastly pumps; these last it is said, were formerly 
very rare, but are now become common? Just so of the people, they were 
formerly very rude and ignorant, but are now becoming enlightened. 

a De Naturae Siraia seu Technica macrocosmi historia, pp. 453, 455. 
b As regards a knowledge of the pump in China, see remarks on Chinese bellows, in 
the next Book. 
c LyelPs Character of the Russians, and a detailed history of Moscow, Lon. 1823, p. 63. 



Chap. 7.] Metallic Pumps. 221 



CHAP TER VII. 

Metallic pumps — Of more extended application than those of wood- Description of one — Devices to 
prevent water in them from freezing — Wells being closed, no obstacle in raising water from them — Ap- 
plication of the atmospheric pump to draw water from great distances as well as depth — Singular cir- 
cumstance attending the trial of a Spanish pump in Seville — Excitement produced by it — Water raised 
to great elevations by atmospheric pressure when mixed with air — Deceptions practised on this prin- 
ciple — Device to raise water fifty feet by atmospheric pressure — Modifications of the pump innumerable 
— Pumps with two pistons — French marine pump — Curved pump — Muschenbroeck's pump — Centrifugal 
pump — West's pump — Jorge's improvement — Original centrifugal pump — Ancient buckets figured in this 
chapter. 

That the public hydraulic machinery of the Romans was of the most 
durable materials sufficiently appears from Vitruvius. The chain of pots 
described by him was, contrary to the practice in Asia and Egypt, wholly 
of metal — the chain was of iron and the buckets of brass. The pumps 
of Ctesibius that were employed in raising water to supply some of the 
public fountains, he informs us, were also of brass and the pipes of cop- 
per or lead. Some of the oldest pumps extant in Europe are formed al- 
together of the latter. Leaden pumps were very common in the 16th 
century. They are mentioned by old physicians among the causes of cer- 
tain diseases in families that drank water out of them. The pump of the 
celebrated alchymist, Dee, alluded to in the last chapter, was a leaden 
one ; and which he expected to be able to transmute into gold, by means 
of the elixir or the philosopher's stone, which he spent his life and fortune 
in seeking. In the vicinity of some English lead mines such pumps have 
for many centuries been in use. The Italian pump that led to the disco- 
very of atmospheric pressure was also a metallic one. 

The introduction of metals in the construction of pumps greatly ex- 
tended their application and usefulness, for they were then no longer re- 
quired to be placed directly over the liquids they raised. Those of wood 
were necessarily placed within the wells out of which they pumped 
water; but when the working cylinder and pipes were of copper or 
lead, the former might be in the interior of a building, while the reservoir 
or well from whence it drew water, was at a distance outside ; the 
pipes forming an air-tight communication between them under the surface 
of the ground. 

The following figure, (No. 90) represents a common metallic sucking 
pump ; the cylinder of cast-iron or copper, and the pipes of lead. It 
will serve to explain the operation of such machines in detail, and to 
show the extent of their application. When this pump is first used, water 
is poured into the cylinder to moisten the leather round the sucker, and 
the pieces which form the clacks or valves ; it also prevents air from pas- 
sing down between the sucker and the sides of the cylinder when the 
former is raised. Now the atmosphere rests equally on both orifices of 
the pipe, the open one in the well, and the other covered by a valve at 
the bottom of the cylinder: in other words, it presses equally on the 
water in the cylinder and in the well which covers both ; a but when by 

a Not absolutely so, or in a strict philosophical sense, but the difference is so slight in 
an altitude of 25 or 28 feet, (the ordinary limits) as to be inappreciable in a practical 
point of view. 



£22 



Common Pumps. 



[Book II. 




?Jo. 90. Common Metallic Pump. 



the depression of the handle or lever, the sucker is raised, this equality is 
destroyed, for the atmospheric column over the cylinder, and consequently 

over the valve O is lifted up, and 
sustained by the sucker alone; it 
therefore no longer presses on the 
upper orifice, while its action on the 
lower one remains undiminished. 
Then as the external air cannot en- 
ter the pipe to restore the equili- 
brium except through its orifice im- 
mersed in the well ; in its efforts to 
do so, (if the expression is allowa- 
ble) it necessarily drives the water 
before it on every ascent of the 
sucker, until the air previously con- 
tained in the pipe is expelled, and 
both pipe and cylinder become filled 
with water. 

The subsequent operation is ob- 
vious. When the sucker descends, 
the clack on its upper surface is rai- 
sed by the resistance of the water 
through which it passes ; and when 
at the bottom of the cylinder, this 
clack closes by its own weight : so 
that when the sucker is again eleva- 
ted, besides overcoming the resis- 
tance of the atmosphere, it carries 
up all the water above it, and which it discharges at the spout — at the 
same time the atmosphere resting undisturbed on the water in the well, 
pushes up a fresh portion into the vacuity formed in the cylinder, and the 
valve O prevents its return. 

Tne horizontal distance between the cylinder or working part of 
the pump and the well is, in theory unlimited, but in practice it seldom 
exceeds one or two hundred feet. In all cases where long pipes are 
used, their bore should be enlarged in proportion to their length, or the 
velocity with which the sucker is raised, should be diminished ; and for 
this reason — time is required to overcome the inertia and friction of long 
columns of water in pipes ; hence a sucker should never be raised faster 
than the pipe can furnish water to fill the vacuity formed by its ascent. 
In pumps whose pipes have too small a bore, it frequently happens that 
the sucker is forcibly driven back when quickly raised, because the water 
had not time to rush through the pipe and fill the vacuity in the cylinder 
as rapidly as it was formed. The bore of wooden pumps being equal 
throughout, the water is not pinched or wire-drawn while passing 
through them, as in most of those of metal. This is one reason why they 
generally work easier than the latter. It is immaterial in what part of 
the pipe the valve O is : it is usually placed at the upper end for the con- 
venience of getting to it when requiring repairs. When it fits close to 
its seat, the water always remains suspended in the pipe, (unless the latter 
should be defective) as mercury is sustained in a barometer tube. 

In cold climates it is a matter of some importance to prevent water in 
pumps from freezing. Metallic pumps are, from the superior conducting 
property of their material, more subject to this evil than those of wood. 
Of various devices a few may be mentioned. The old mode of enclosing 



Chap. 7.] Limits of the perpendicular length of Suction Pipes. 223 

the pump in a case containing tanners' bark, charcoal, the dung of hor- 
ses, &c. is continued. Others are to prevent the valve O from sitting close 
to its seat, or to open it, by pressing the sucker upon a pin attached to 
it, so that the contents of the cylinder and pipe may descend into the well ; 
hence every time the pump is used a fresh portion is required to ' prime 
it.' A more common method is to connect the lower part of the cylinder 
with the, suction pipe by a stop cock and short tube, as at C. By opening 
the cock the water in the pump descends through it into the pipe. But 
the usual practice in this country, is to make the cylinder of such a length 
that two or three feet of it may be below the surface of the ground, and 
out of the reach of the frost ; about a foot above the valve O or lower 
box, a plain cock is inserted : in winter this cock is left partially open, 
and the water above escapes slowly through it into the ground ; while 
that below, into which the sucker is made to extend at its lowest position, 
serves instead of fresh 'priming.' 

A similar device is attached to the lateral pipes that convey the water 
of the Schuylkill into the houses of Philadelphia. 

Some persons can scarcely conceive how the atmosphere can have ac- 
cess to a well, while the latter is covered with slabs of stone or timber, 
and a thick bed of clay or mould over all. They forget that it is the ra- 
rity of air, the extreme minuteness of its particles, which enables it to 
circulate through the finest soils, as freely as people pass through the va- 
rious chambers and passages of their dwellings. Were the sides of a 
well coated, and its mouth covered with the best hydraulic cement — no 
sooner could the sucker or piston of a pump produce a partial vacuum 
within it, than the air would stream through the cement as water through 
a colander or shower bath. And if the top and sides were rendered per- 
fectly air-tight, it would then enter the bottom and ascend through the 
water without any perceptible obstruction. If it were possible to make 
a well impervious to air, no water could be raised from it by one of these 
pumps : no movement of the sucker could then bring it up. We might 
examine the apparatus with solicitude — remove its defects with care — 
consult the learned with the Florentines, or get enraged like the Spanish 
pump maker of Seville ; — still, the water, like Glendower's spirits of the 
deep, would in spite of all our efforts refuse to rise. 

When the atmospheric pump is required to raise water from a perpen- 
dicular depth, not exceeding 26 or 28 feet, (i. e. in those parts of the earth 
where the mercury in the barometer generally stands at 30 inches) the 
length of the cylinder need not exceed that which is required for the 
stroke of the sucker. In all cases, the perpendicular distance between 
the sucker, when at the highest point of its stroke and the level of the 
water, should never exceed the same number of feet as the tube of a ba- 
rometer, at the place where the pump is to be used, contains inches of mer- 
cury. But in the temperate zones where pumps are chiefly used, the pres- 
sure of the air varies sometimes to the extent of two inches of mercury, or 
between two and three feet of water ; hence the distance should be some- 
thing less. And as the level of water in wells is subject to changes, it is the 
laudable practice of pump makers to construct the cylinder and rod of the 
sucker, of such a length, that the latter may always work within 26 or 28 
feet of the water. 

By keeping the above rule in view, water may be raised by these 
pumps from wells of all depths ; for after it has once entered the cy- 
linder, it is raised thence by the sucker independently of the atmosphere, 
and to any height to which the cylinder is extended. This seems to have 
been well understood by old engineers. The remark of those who made 



224 Singular incident in trying a Tump at Seville. [Book 11. 

the Florentine pump is a proof; and others might be adduced from much 
older authorities. Plate 48, in Besson's Theatre, represents an atmos- 
pheric pump raising water from a river to the top of a high tower. The 
cylinder is square, formed of plank and bound with iron clamps. It is 
shown as nearly four times the length of the suction pipe, which is round. 
When pump rods are required of great length, they should be made of 
pine. This wood does not warp, and as it is rather lighter than water, its 
weight has not to be overcome (like iron rods) when raising the sucker. 

A circumstance to which we have slightly alluded, was announced in 
the public papers of Europe, in the year 1766, which roused the attention 
of philosophers ; for it seemed to threaten a renewal of the disputes about 
a vacuum, and the ascent of water in pumps and siphons, &c. A tinman 
of Seville, in Spain, undertook to raise water from a well 60 feet deep, 
by the common pump. Instead of making the sucker play within 30 feet 
of the water, he made the rod so short, that it did not reach within 50 
feet of it. As a necessary consequence, he could not raise any. Being 
greatly disappointed, he descended the well to examine the pipe, while 
a person above was employed in working the pump; and at last in a fit 
of despair, at his want of success, he dashed the hatchet or hammer in 
his hand, violently against the pipe. By this act a small opening was 
made in the pipe about ten feet above the water — when, what must have 
been his surprise ! the water instantly ascended and was discharged at 
the spout ! 

The fact being published, it was by some adduced as a proof that the 
pressure of the atmosphere could sustain a perpendicular column of water 
much longer than 32 or 34 feet, and consequently that the experiments of 
Torricelli and Pascal were inconclusive. M. Lecat, a surgeon at Rouen 
in Normandy, repeated the experiment with a pump in his garden : he 
bored a small hole in the suction pipe ten feet above the water, to which 
he adapted a cock. When it was open, the water could be discharged 
at the height of 55 feet, instead of 30 when it was shut. 

As might be supposed, these experiments when investigated, instead 
of overthrowing the received doctrine of atmospheric pressure, more 
fully confirmed it. It was ascertained that the air on entering the pipe 
became mixed with the water; and which therefore, instead of being car- 
ried up in an unbroken column, was raised in disjointed portions, or in the 
form of thick rain. This mixture being much lighter than water alone, 
a longer column of it could be supported by the atmosphere : and by pro- 
portioning the quantity of air admitted, a column of the compound fluid 
may be elevated one or two hundred feet by the atmospheric pump ; but 
there is no advantage in raising water in this manner by the pump, and 
we believe it is seldom or never practiced. In a paper, on the duty per- 
formed by the Cornwall Steam Engines in raising water, in the Journal 
of the Franklin Institute for May, 1837, it is stated that a little air is 
sometimes admitted in the pump pipes, which it is alledged, "made the 
pump work more lively, in consequence of the spring it gave to the co- 
lumn of water, and caused less strain to the machinery." In the same 
paper Mr. Perkins states that forty years before, an attempt was made to 
impose upon him in this country, a pump which raised water by atmo- 
spheric pressure 100 feet : but he detected "a small pin hole" in the pipe 
through which the air was admitted. 

The same deception it seems gave rise to the humorous poetical satire, 
i Terrible Tractoration.' The ingenious author states in his preface, that 
he was employed in 1801, as agent for a company in Vermont, and of 
which he was a member, to proceed to London, and secure a patent for 



Chap. 7.] Modifications of Atmospheric Pumps. 225 

' a new invented hydraulic machine.' "I was urged to hurry my depar- 
ture in consequence of a report in circulation, that certain persons by 
stealth had made themselves masters of the invention, and were deter- 
mined to anticipate us in our object of securing a patent in London. In 
consequence of this report, the experiments made with this machine were 
performed in a hasty manner. By it, water was raised through leaky tin 
pipes in a hasty experiment, 42 feet from the surface of the fountain to the 
bottom of the cylinders, in which the pistons were worked. I embarked 
from New- York the 5th of May, and arrived in London after a tedious 
passage the 4th of July. I waited on Mr. King, then ambassador from 
the United States, to whom I had letters, and was by him favored with a 
letter to Mr. Nicholson, an eminent philosopher and chemist. With this 
gentleman I had several interviews on the subject of my hydraulic ma- 
chine, and from him received an opinion in writing unfavorable to its 
merits. I likewise made a number of experiments in London, with a 
different result from what I had seen in Vermont. In this desperate si- 
tuation of the adventure, I received a letter from one of the Vermont 
Company, informing me there was a deception in the patent — that from 
experiments made subsequent to my departure, it appeared that no water 
could be raised by Langdon's invention higher than by the common pump, 
unless by a perforation in the pipe, which made what the inventor called 
an air hole, and which by him had been kept a secret. Mr. Nicholson in- 
formed me that a similar deception had been practised on the Academi- 
cians of Paris, but that the trick was discovered by the hissing noise made 
by the air rushing into the aperture." From the disappointment Mr. Fes- 
senden turned to his pen, and wrote ' The modern Philosopher or Terrible 
Tractoration. 1 See preface to 2nd American ed. Phil. 1806. 

It is possible however to raise water by a short cylinder, fifty or even 
a hundred feet high, but for all practical purposes the device is useless. 
The first thing of the kind that we know of, was accomplished nearly 
forty years ago by a boy. He fixed a small pump (the cylinder was 12 
inches in length) in the garret of a high dwelling, and a tub of water 
in the cellar, the perpendicular distance being nearly 50 feet. About 
half way up the stairs, he placed a close vessel, (a three gallon tin boiler) 
from the bottom of which a small leaden tube was continued to the pump 
cylinder; and another tube being soldered to the top, descended into the 
tub of water. A third tube was soldered to the top of the vessel, and 
terminated near the pump, having a cock soldered to the end. This cock 
being shut and the pump worked, the air in the pipes and the vessel was 
withdrawn, and the latter consequently filled with water by the atmo- 
sphere ; he then opened the cock which admitted the atmosphere to act on 
the surface of the water in the vessel, and by again working the pump the 
contents of the vessel were raised and discharged in the garret. By a se- 
ries of close vessels placed at distances not exceeding 30 feet above each 
other, water may be raised in this manner to any elevation. 

It is impossible to notice here a moiety of the projects for improving 
the atmospheric pump and the various . parts of which it is composed; 
their name is legion, and this volume is far too limited to comprise an ac- 
count of them all. Those that we are about to describe are of modern 
date, but it does not therefore follow that they were unknown to the an- 
cients. Men in every age, when striving to accomplish a specific object, 
naturally fall into similar trains of thought, and hit upon the same or nearly 
the same devices. Could the ancient history of this machine be procured, 
it would we have no doubt prove, that (like the instruments invented by a 
celebrated French surgeon, fac-similes of which of exquisite finish, were 

29 



Pump with two Pistons. 



[Book II. 



subsequently found in Pompeii) not a few of its diversified modifications 
were anticipated by Greek and Roman machinists. Why then were they 
not preserved or continued in use? For the same reason that the old 
pump is still generally preferred : and were it not for the art of printing 
it is probable that not one of the modern improvements of this machine 
would be known 2000 years hence, any more than those devised by the 
ancients are now known to us. Those persons who are familiar with it, 
well know that a large majority of its supposed improvers, have returned 
from long and laborious mental pilgrimages in its behalf, laden, like old 
devotees, with little else than stores of worthless relics. 

Of innumerable variations in its construc- 
tion, the greater part consists of different 
modes of communicating motion to the rod, 
by wheels, cranks, racks and pinions, cams, 
plain and jointed levers, pendulums, balance 
poles, vibrating platforms, &c. Of these it 
would be useless to speak. Others consist in 
two or more suckers in the same cylinder; in 
altering the form of the latter ; and some in 
imparting motion to the cylinder, and dispen- 
sing with the sucker. We shall notice some 
of these here, and others in the next Book. 

The introduction of two suckers or pistons 
into one cylinder has long been a favorite 
project. Dr. Conyers in 1673 proposed a 
pump of this kind. He made it of plank, 
square and tapered, (in the form of an inver- 
ted and truncated pyramid,) 8£ feet long, 20 
inches square at the upper end, and 8 at the 
bottom where the valve or lower box was 
placed. He fixed two suckers on the same 
rod, one at its lc ver end and the other so as 
to play half way down the trunk. This pump 
he said, raised "at least twice as much water 
as the ordinary one of the same size." If 
such was the fact, it was by the expenditure 
of twice as much force. Had the bore of 
the trunk, where the upper sucker played, 
been uniform throughout, and the lower 
sucker laid aside, and with it the force ex- 
pended in moving it, the result would clearly 
have equalled that of both. Phil. Trans. 
Abridg. Vol. i, 545. 

About the year 1780, Mr. Taylor of South- 
ampton, Eng. introduced two suckers or pis- 
tor.s into one cylinder, each united to a separate rod, that one might as- 
cend as the other descended, and thus discharge double the quantity of 
water : No. 91 is a figure of it. The rod of the lower sucker slides 
through the centre of the upper one ; and also through its valve, which 
is a spherical or hemispherical piece of brass, placed loosely over its seat 
and to which the rod acts as a guide. The upper parts of the rods ter- 
minate in racks, between which a cog wheel is placed, having an alternate 
movement imparted to it, by a lever attached to its axis, as in the common 
air pump. 

Anothei mode of working this pump, is by means of a drum fixed to 




No. 91. Double Piston Pumpt 



Chap. 7.] 



Working Ship Pumps by Ropes. 



227 



one end of the shaft of the cog wheel; over this a rope is passed and 
crossed below, to which any number of men, on each side, may apply 
their strength. Both parties pull the rope towards them by turns, and 
thereby impart the requisite movement to the cog wheel, and consequently 
to the pump rods and suckers, as shown in No. 92. Mr. Adams, in his 
Lectures on Natural Philosophy, published in 1794, observed that these 
kind of pumps had been "in general use in the royal navy for five or six 
years." Vol. iii, 392. 




No. 92. Working Ship Pumps by Ropes. 

In 1813, the London Society of Arts awarded a medal and twenty 
guineas to Mr. P. Hedderwick, for various modes of imparting motion to 
two pistons in the same cylinder, by a series of levers, instead of cog wheels 
and racks. Trans, vol. xxxii, 98. 

Atmospheric pumps with two pistons are used in the French marine, 
and are arranged so as to be worked by the men as in the act of rowing. 
Neither racks nor pinions are used in communicating motion to the 
rods. The upper ends of these are continued outside the cylinders and 
bent a little outwards, and then connected by a bolt to each end of a short 
vibrating beam which is moved by the men. The rods do not descend 
in the centre of the cylinder, as in the preceding figure, but are attached 
to one side of the suckers. The lower rod passes through an opening in 
the upper sucker, which is closed by a collar of leather. Hachette's 
Traite Elementaire des Machines. Paris, 1819, p. 153. 

Pumps with double pistons are not of modern date : there is one figured 
in Besson's Theatre des Instrumens. 

The alledged superiority of these pumps is more specious than real. 
It is true the inertia of the water in ascending the pipes has not to be 
overcome at every stroke, as in the common pump, since its motion through 
them is continuous ; nor is its direction changed, as when two separate 
cylinders are used, being then diverted into them from the pipes at angles 
more or less acute. These are real advantages; but if we mistake not, 
they are the only ones, unless taking up less room on ship board be an- 
other. But from the cylinders being twice the ordinary length, these 
machines are really double pumps ; having not only two suckers and two 
rods, v but also two cylinders, and requiring twice the power to work them. 
The principal difference between them and the usual double pump, is that 
the cylinders are united together on the same axis, while in the latter, 
they are placed parallel to each other. In point of economy, we think 
pumps with two distinct cylinders are preferable; they are less complex, 
and of course less liable to derangement : a longer stroke can be ob- 
tained in them, and, what is of more importance, when one is disordered, 
the other can be continued in use. On these considerations we believe 
double piston pumps were abandoned in the British navy. 

A singular modification of the common pump was devised in England 
in 1819, for which the Society of Arts awarded a premium of twenty 
guineas. The chamber was curved, and the centre of the circle, of which 



228 



Muschenbroeck's Pump. 



[Book II. 



it formed a part, served as a fulcrum on which the rod and handle (both of 
one piece) moved. The rod was curved so as to move in the centre of 

the chamber. 




No. 93. Curved Pump. 

The objects supposed to have been attained by this arrangement, were 
" greater simplicity of workmanship," and " greater steadiness and preci- 
sion of action" (of the sucker.) The device is ingenious, but can never be 
generally adopted. The spring of the rod with the wear of the bolt on 
which it turns, must soon render the play of the sucker and wear of the 
chamber unequal : the difficulty and expense of making the latter curvi- 
linear, and of repairing it when bruised or otherwise injured, are fatal 
objections. The pipe must be separated from the chamber to get at the 

lower box or valve ; and the application 
of the pump is limited to depths within 
30 feet. We have noticed it, lest the 
same idea occurring to some of our me- 
chanics, should lead them to a useless 
expenditure of time and money. In the 
same year a patent was issued in Eng- 
land for making the cylinder in the form 
of a ring, or nearly so, the centre of 
which was the fulcrum on which the pis- 
ton turned, and an alternating motion 
was imparted to the latter. Repertory 
of Arts, vol. xxxv. 1819. 

An interesting modification of the at- 
mospheric pump was described by Mus- 
chenbroeck in his Natural Philosophy. 
Instead of a piston or sucker working 
inside of the cylinder, the latter itself is 
moved, being made to slide over the pipe 
somewhat in the manner of telescope 
tubes. No. 94 represents this pump. 
The upper end of the suction pipe, being 
made of copper or brass, and its exte- 
rior smooth and straight, is passed 
tt. ough the bottom of a small cistern. Its orifice is closed by a valve 
opening upwards. A short cylinder whose diameter exceeds that of the 
suction pipe is slipped over the latter; and to its lower end a stuffing box 
is adapted to prevent air or water from passing between them. Its upper 




No. 94. Muschenbroeck's Pump. 



Chap. 7.] 



Centrifugal Pump. 



229 



end is covered by a valve also opening upward. The pump rod is at- 
tached to the same end by a fork, as represented in the figure. . By mo- 
ving the cylinder up and down, the air within it and the pipe is soon ex- 
pelled, and its place occupied by a portion of the water in which the 
lower end of the suction pipe is immersed. When the cylinder is then 
raised the atmosphere forces up water into it, and when it is depressed, 
the water being prevented by the valve on the end of the pipe from de- 
scending into the well, escapes out of that on the top of the cylinder, pre- 
cisely as in the bellows pump. (p. 206.) By keeping water in the cistern, 
air is effectually prevented from entering between the pipes at the stuffing 
box, even if it be not perfectly tight. A cup or dish formed on the upper 
end of the cylinder to contain a little water over the valve, would be an 
advantage in this description of pumps, for any defects in it by which 
air is admitted would be fatal, as a vacuum could not then be 
formed within the cylinder, and of course no water raised by it. Our 
common pumps would be almost useless if water was not kept over the 
valves ; it is that which renders them air tight, and consequently efficient. 
In the early part of the 18th century, a new method of exciting the pres- 
sure of the atmosphere for the purpose of raising water was adopted. Its 
discoverer burst the fetters with which long established modes of accom- 
plishing this object had embarrassed common minds. He left the old track 
entirely, and the result of his researches was a philosophical machine that 
bears no resemblance to those by which it was preceded. 

Most people are practically acquainted with the principle of the Centri- 
fugal pump, viz. that by which a body revolving round a centre tends 
to recede from it, and with a force proportioned to its velocity : thus mud 
is thrown from the rims of carriage wheels, when they move rapidly over 
wet roads ; a stone in a sling darts off the moment it is released ; a bucket 
of water may be whirled like a stone in a sling and the contents retained 
even when the bottom is upwards. A sailor on ship board, or a house- 
maid, dries a wet mop by whirling it till the force communicated to the 
watery particles overcomes their adhesion to the woolen fibres. Boys 
sometimes stick pellets of tough clay to the end of a switch or flexible rod, 
and then drawing it quickly through the air, the force imparted to the balls 

sends them to their destination. If a 
tube be substituted for the rod, and 
the end that is held in the hand clo- 
sed, by a similar movement, balls 
dropped or water poured into it, 
would be thrown forward in like 
manner; and if by some arrange- 
ment the movement of the tube was 
made continuous, projected streams 
of either balls or water might be 
rendered constant: the centrifugal 
gun is a contrivance to accomplish 
the one — the centrifugal pump the 
other. 

This pump generally consists of 
tubes, united in the form of a cross 
or letter T, placed perpendicularly 
in the water to be raised. (No. 95.) 
The lower end is supported on a pivot; perforations are made to admit 
the water, and just above them a valve to retain it when the pump is no\ 
in motion. The ends of the transverse part are bent downwards to dis- 




No. 95. Centrifugal Pump. 



230 



Centrifugal Pumps. 



[Book II. 



charge the water into a circular trough, over which they turn. To charge 
it, the orifices may be closed by loosely inserting a cork into each, and 
then filling the pump through an opening at the top which is then closed 
by a screw cap. A rapid rotary motion is imparted to the machine by a 
pulley fixed on the axis and driven by a band, from a drum, &c. The 
centrifugal force thus communicated to the water in the 
arms or transverse tube, throws it out; and the atmo- 
sphere pushes up the perpendicular one fresh portions 
to supply the place of those ejected. These pumps are 
sometimes made with a single arm like the letter L in- 
verted ; at others quite a number radiate from the up- 
right one. It has also been made of a series of tubes 
arranged round a vertical shaft in the form of an inver- 
ted cone. A valuable improvement was submitted by 
M. Jorge to the French Academy in 1816. It consists 
in imparting motion to the arms only, thus saving the 
power consumed in moving the upright tube, and by 
which the latter can be inclined as circumstances or lo- 
cations may require. 

A combination of the centrifugal pump with Parent's 
or Barker's mill, was proposed by Dr. West, which in 
some locations may be adopted with advantage. It is sim- 
ply a vertical shaft round which two tubes are wound : 
(No. 96) the upper one is the pump; the lower one the 
mill. The area of the lower one should be to that of the 
upper in the inverse ratio of the perpendicular height, 
and as much more as is necessary to overcome the fric- 
tion. The cup or basin into which the stream (part of 
which is to be raised) is directed, may be attached to the shaft and turn 
with it, or the latter may pass through it. Tilloch's Phil. Mag. vol. xi. 

The first centrifugal pump appears to have 
been invented by M. Le Demour, who 
sent a description of it to the French 
Academy in 1732. (Machines approuve. 
Tom. vi, p. 9.) It was merely a straight 
tube attached in an inclined position to a 
vertical axis, and whirled round by the 
handle — the tube was fastened by liga- 
tures to three strips of wood projecting 
from the axis, as shown at No. 97. 

With this pump we close our remarks 
on devices for raising water by atmo- 
spheric pressure; more might have been 
added, but as nearly all the machines yet 
to be described illustrate the same prin- 
ciple, the reader is referred to the fol- 
lowing Books, and particularly to the at- 
mospheric and forcing pumps described in 
the next one. 

[The vessels under the pump spouts in Nos. 90, 93 and 94, are Roman 
bronze buckets from Pompeii.] 




No. 96. West's Pump. 




No. 97. Le Demour's Pump. 



END OP THE SECOND BOOK. 



BOOK III 



MACHINES FOR RAISING WATER BY COMPRESSURE INDEPENfc 
ENTLY OF ATMOSPHERIC INFLUENCE. 



C HAP TEE I. 

Definition of machines described in this Book — Forcing Pumps — Analogy between thens andbelV*^' 
—History of the bellows that of the pump — Forcing pumps are water bellows — The Bellows of ant*A 
luvian origin — Tubal Cain — Anacharsis — Vulcan in his forge — Egyptian, Hindoo, and Peruvian blowing 
tubes — Primitive bellows of goldsmiths in Barbary — Similar instruments employed to eject liquids — de- 
vices to obtain a continuous blast — Double bellows of the Foulah blacksmiths, without valves — Simple 
Asiatic bellows — Domestic bellows of modern Egypt — Double bellows of the ancient Egyptians — Bel- 
lows blowers in the middle ages — Lantern bellows common over all the East — Specimens from Agricola 
— Used by negroes in the interior of Africa — Modern Egyptian blacksmiths' bellows — Vulcan's bellows 
— Various kinds of Roman bellows — Bellows of Grecian blacksmiths referred to in a prediction of the 
Delphic oracle — Application of lantern bellows as forcing pumps — Sucking and forcing bellows pumps 
— Modern domestic bellows of ancient origin — Used to raise water — Common blacksmiths' bellows em- 
ployed as forcing pumps — Ventilation of mines. 

Machines of the third class described in this Book, are such as act by 
compressure : the water is first admitted into close vessels and then for- 
cibly expelled through apertures made for that purpose. This is effected 
in some by compressing the vessels themselves, as in bellows pumps — in 
others by a solid body impinging on the surface of the liquid, as in fire en- 
gines — sometimes a column of water is used for the same purpose, at 
others the expansive force of compressed air. Of the last two, Heron's 
fountain, air engines, and soda fountains, are examples. Strictly con- 
sidered, these machines have nothing to do with the pressure of the at- 
mosphere, (the active principle of those of the second class,) but in prac- 
tice it is very generally employed. When the working cylinder of a for- 
cing pump is immersed in the water it is intended to raise, or when the 
latter flows into it by gravity, it is a forcing pump simply; but when the 
cylinder is elevated above the water that supplies it, and consequently is 
then charged by atmospheric pressure, the machine is a compound one, 
embracing the peculiar properties of both sucking and forcing pumps. 
The latter therefore differ from the former in raising water above their 
cylinders ; and to elevations that are only limited by the strength of their 
materials and the power employed to work them. They have been con- 
sidered by some writers as the oldest of all pumps. We shall consider 
their varieties in the order in which we suppose they were developed. 

An intimate connection has ever subsisted between the forcing pump 
and the bellows ; they are not only identical in principle, but every form 
adopted in one has been applied to the other. The bellows, from the 
simple sack or skin employed by the negroes of Africa to the complex 
and efficient instrument of China, and the enormous blowing machines of 



232 Antiquity of Bellows. [Book III. 

our foundries, has been used to raise water: and every modification of the 
pump, not even excepting the screw, has been applied as a bellows* A 
singular proof of the analogy between them and of their connection in 
ancient times, is, that in one of the earliest accounts we have of the cylin- 
drical pump, (viz. by Vitruvius) it was used as a bellows "to supply 
wind to hydraulic organs." And that rotary pumps are as numerous as 
rotary bellows, is known to every mechanic. Thus, while pumps have 
been used as bellows, bellows have been employed as pumps; and every 
device to obtain a continuous current of air in the one, has been adopted 
to induce an unbroken stream of water in the other. 

The history of the bellows is also that of the pump; and if we mistake 
not it affords the only legitimate source now open in which the origin of 
the latter can be sought for with any prospect of success. Under this 
impression we shall examine the bellows of various people, and in doing 
so the reader will find an auxiliary, but very important branch of the sub- 
ject, illustrated at the same time, viz. that which relates to valves, for the 
bellows was probably the first instrument of which they formed a part. 
No other machine equally ancient can be pointed out in which they were 
required. In fine, the forcing pump is obviously derived from the bel- 
lows, or rather it is an application of that instrument to blow water in- 
stead of air — an application probably coeval with its invention. 

The origin of the arts is generally considered as a subject of mere con- 
jecture. Antiquarians and historians despair of discovering any thing of 
importance relating to the early history of any of the simple machines. In 
the present case, however, there can be no doubt that the first bellows was 
the mouth ; and it was the first pump too, both atmospheric and forcing. 
The representation of it when employed as a bellows was a favorite sub- 
ject with ancient statuaries and painters. Pliny gives several examples, 
and among others, Stipax the Cyprian, who cast an elegant figure of a 
boy " roasting and frying meat at the fire, puffing and blowing thereat 
with his mouth full of wind, to make it burn." Aristoclides, was also cele- 
brated for a painting of a boy, "blowing hard at the coals ; the whole in- 
terior of the room appeared to be illuminated with the fire thus urged by 
the boy's breath, and also what a mouth the boy makes." Holland's 
Translation. 

That the bellows is of antediluvian origin, there can be little doubt, 
for neither Tubal Cain nor any of his pupils could have reduced and 
wrought iron without it. The tongs, anvil and hammer of Vulcan, (or Tubal 
Cain) have come down to our times, and although the particular form of 
his bellows be not ascertained, that instrument is, we believe, as certainly 
continued in use at the present day, as the tools just named. Nor is there 
any thing incredible in such belief, for if even the common opinion, that 
the whole globe was enveloped in the deluge, be true, Noah and his sons, 
aware that the destinies of their posterity, so far as regarded the arts of 
civilization, must in a great measure depend upon them, would naturally 
secure the means of transmitting to them the knowledge of those ma- 
chines that related to metallurgy, as among the most essential of all. Of 
these, the bellows was quite as important as any other ; without it, other 
tools would have been of little avail. Now if we refer to oriental ma- 
chinery, (among which the bellows of the son of Lamech is to be found 
if at all,) we shall find, in accordance with its characteristic unchangeable- 
ness, that the instrument now used over all Hindostan and Asia in gene- 
ral, and by the modern blacksmiths of Cairo and Rosetta, is identical with 

a Hachette's Traite elementaire des Machines, p. 142. 



Chap. 1.] Its Origin. 233 

that with which the smiths of Memphis, and Thebes, and Heliopolis, 
urged their fires, between three and four thousand years ago, and is similar 
to those found figured in the forges of Vulcan on ancient medals and 
sculptures. Numerous were the forms in which the bellows was anciently 
made, but the general features of the one to which we allude, (the lantern 
bellows) have remained as unchangeable as those of blacksmiths them- 
selves. 

Strabo attributed the bellows to Anacharsis who lived about 600 years 
B. C. but it is probable that some particular form of it only was intended, 
for it is not credible that the Greeks in Solon's time could have been igno- 
rant of an instrument that is coeval with the knowledge of metals ; and 
without which the iron money of Lycurgus, two centuries before, could 
never have been made. Pliny (B. vii, 56) attributes it with greater pro- 
priety to the Cyclops, who are supposed to have flourished before the 
deluge. The prophet Jeremiah, who lived long before Anacharsis, speaks 
of it in connection with metallurgical operations. " The bellows are 
burned, the lead is consumed of the fire, the founder melteth in vain." 
Isaiah, who lived still earlier, viz. in the 8th century B. C. alludes to the 
blacksmith's bellows — "the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire." And 
Job, nine or ten centuries before the Scythian philosopher flourished, 
speaks of "a fire not blown." The prophet Ezekiel also speaks of the 
blastfurnace as common — "they gather silver, and brass, and iron, and 
lead, and tin, into the midst of the furnace, to blow thejire upon it to melt 
it " xxii, 20. Homer, as might be supposed, could not fully describe 
the labors of Vulcan, without referring to this instrument. His account 
of the great mechanic at work, is equally descriptive of a smith and his 
forge of the present day. 

Obscure in smoke, his forges flaming round, 
While bathed in sweat from fire to fire he flew ; 
And puffing loud, the roaring bellows blew. 
****** 
Just as the god directs, now loud, now low, 
They raise a tempest, or they gently blow. 

Iliad, xvm, 435, 545. Pope. 

The first approach made to artificial bellows- was the application of a 
reed or other natural tube, through which to direct a stream of air from the 
mouth — a device that has never passed into desuetude. Such was the ori- 
gin of the modern blow-pipe, an instrument originally designed to increase 
the intensity of ordinary fires, but which subsequently became (as the arts 
were developed) indispensible to primitive workers in metal. How long 
blowing tubes preceded the invention of other devices for the same pur- 
pose is uncertain; but from the fact that oriental jewelers and goldsmiths 
still fuse metal in pots by them, it may be inferred they were the only in- 
struments in use for ages, before the bellows proper was known: a circum- 
stance to which their universal employment over all Asia at the present 
time may be attributed, and the skilful management of them by mechanics 
there. As the only contrivance for urging fires in primitive times, men 
would naturally become expert in using them, and, as in all the arts of 
the East, their dexterity in this respect would be inherited by their chil- 
dren, and be retained in connection with their use, with that tenacity that 
has scarcely ever been known to give up an ancient tool or the ancient 
mode of using it: hence the paucity of their implements; a file, a ham- 
mer, a pair of tongs, and a blowing tube, being in general all that the 
budget of an African or Asiatic jeweler contains. 

As we have given figures of sucking tubes to illustrate the origin of 

30 



234 



Egyptian, Hindoo, and Peruvian Blowpipes. [Book III. 



the atmospheric pump, we here insert some of blowing tubes, as showing 
the incipient state of the forcing pump. 




No. 98. Egyptian using a reed. 1600 B. C. No. 99. Ancient Egyptian Goldsmith 

No. 98, represents an Egyptian blowing a fire with a reed. It is from 
the paintings at Beni Hassan, and extends back through a period of 3,500 
years. According to Mr. Wilkinson, the figure is that of a goldsmith, 
" blowing the fire for melting the gold," but from the comparative large 
size of the vessel, it would seem rather to be a cauldron in which the ar- 
ticles were pickled. No. 99, is the figure of a goldsmith either soldering 
or fusing metal with the blow-pipe, from the sculptures at Thebes. The 
portable furnace has raised cheeks to confine and reflect the heat. The 
pipe is of metal with the end enlarged and pointed.* 

Sonnerat, has given (in the volume 
of illustrations to his voyages,) a plate 
representing modern goldsmiths of 
Hindostan, from which the annexed 
figure (No. 100) is copied. It will 
serve to show, when compared with 
the preceding cuts, what little chan- 
ges have taken place in some mechani- 
cal manipulations in the East, from 
very remote times. A similar figure is 
in Shoberl's Hindostan. The same 
mode of fusing their metals was prac- 
ticed by the ancient gold and silver 
smiths of Mexico and Peru. Instead 
of bellows, says Garcilasso, the latter 
had blow-pipes "made of copper, 
about a yard long, the ends of which 
were narrow, that the breath might pass more forcibly by means of the 
contraction, and as the fire was to be more or less; so accordingly they 
used eight, ten, or twelve of these pipes at once, as the quantity of metal 
did require." (Commentaries on Peru, p. 52.) 

The next step was to apply a leathern bag or sack, formed of the skin 
of some animal, to one end of the tube (shown in No. 80) as a substitute 
for the mouth and lungs. The bag was inflated by the act of opening it, 
or by blowing into it, and its contents expelled by pressure. To such 
Homer seems to allude in his account of Eolus assisting Ulysses: 

The adverse winds in leathern bags he braced, 

Compressed their force, and locked each struggling blast. Odys. 10. 

a Ancient bronze tongs or forceps, similar to those in the cut, have been found in 
Egypt, which retain their spring perfectly. Crucibles similar to those used at the 
present day have also been discovered. Wilkinson's Manners and Customs of the An- 
cient Egyptians, vol. iii, 224. 




No. 100. Goldsmith of Hindostan 



Chap. 1.] Origin of the Valve. — African Bellows. 235 

And Ovid : 

A largess to Ulysses he consigned, 

And in a steer's tough hide enclosed a wind. Met. xiv. 

The goldsmiths' bellows of Barbary consists of a goat's skin, having a 
reed inserted into it: 'he holds the reed with one hand and presses the 
bag with the other.' (Ed. Encyc. vol. iii, 258.) The Damaras, a tribe of 
negroes in Southern Africa mentioned by Barrow, manufacture copper 
rings, &c. from the ore. The bellows they use, he observes, "is made of 
the skin of a gemsbok, (a species of deer) converted into a sack, with the 
horn of the same animal fixed to one end for a pipe." 

Simple instruments of this description have always been applied to 
eject liquids. Small ones were commonly used by ancient physicians in 
administering enemas ; a purpose for which they are still used. Large 
ones were recommended by Apollodorus the architect, a contemporary of 
Pliny and Trajan, as a substitute for fire engines, when the latter were 
not at hand. When the upper part of a house was on fire, and no ma- 
chine for throwing water to be procured, hollow reeds, he observed, 
might be fastened to leathern bags filled with water, and the liquid pro- 
jected on the flames by compressing them. 

As the current of wind from a single sack or bag, necessarily ceased 
as soon as it was collapsed, some mode of rendering the blast continuous 
was desirable ; and in the working of iron indispensible. The most ob- 
vious plan to accomplish this was to make use of two bags, and to work 
them so that one might be inhaling the air, while the other was expelling 
it — that is, as one was distended, the other might be compressed. This 
device we shall find was very early adopted, and by all the nations of 
antiquity. 

But by far the most important improvement on the primitive bellows or 
bag, was the admission of air by a separate opening — a contrivance that 
led to the invention of the valve, one of the most essential elements of 
hydraulic as well as pneumatic machinery. The first approach to the 
ordinary valve, was a device that is still common in the bellows of some 
African tribes. A bag formed of the skin of a goat, has a reed attached 
to it to convey the blast to the fire ; and the part which covered the neck 
of the animal is left open for the admission of air. This part is gathered up 
in the hand when the bag is compressed, and opened when it is distended. 




No. 101. Bellows of the Foulah Blacksmiths. 

An improvement upon this primeval device is exhibited in the bellows 
of the Foulah blacksmiths, on the western coasts of Africa. It consists 



23G 



Primitive Bellows of Asia. 



[Book III 



of two calabashes connected together by two hollow bamboos or reeds, in- 
serted into their sides, and united at an angle to another which leads to the 
fire, as represented in the figure. A large opening is made on the top 
of each, and a cylindrical bag or tube made of soft goats' skins stitched 
or otherwise secured round the edges. The workman seats himself on 
the ground, and placing the machine between his legs, he grasps the ends 
of the bags, and by alternately raising each with the mouth open, and 
pushing it into the calabash when closed, the air in the latter is forced 
into the fire, and a uniform blast maintained. The action is very similar 
to that of gathering in the hands the lower edges of two hat linings, and 
constantly drawing one out and thrusting the other in. 

The negroes of the Gold Coast are represented to have other kinds of 
bellows. The principal tools of their smiths, are "a hard stone for an 
anvil, a pair of tongs and a small pair of bellows, with three or more 
pipes, which blow very strong — an invention of their own." We have 
not been able to find any description of these. See Grand Gazetteer, 
Art. Guinea ; and Histoire Generale, torn, v, 214. 

Another species equally simple but more efficient, is common in Asia, 
Africa, and also in Wallachia, Greece and other parts of Europe. The 
contrivance for admitting the air is an improvement upon the last, but the 
orifice is still opened and closed by the fingers of the blower. Instead 
of the mouth of each bag being drawn up in the hand, it is stretched out 
in the form of a long slit; to the lips of which two strips of wood are 
sewed. The inner side of each strip is made straight and smooth, so that 
when brought together, they form a close joint. They are grasped in 
the middle by the workman, who alternately opens them when he raises 
the mouth to admit the air, and closes them when he expels it. 

No. 102 represents the assist- 
ant of a Hindoo blacksmith, urg- 
ing his fire with a pair of these 
instruments, (copied from the 
volume of plates to Sonnerat's 
Voyages.) From an inspection 
of the figure, it will be perceived 
that the strips facilitate the act of 
compressing each bag, by their ex- 
tending quite over it, as well as by 
their stiffness: in these respects 
they may be considered as the 
nucleus of the boards in the com- 
mon bellows. In this device, the 
valve becomes further developed. 
To similar instruments, Mr. 
Emerson refers in his 'Letters from the Egean.' The crew of a Hy- 
driot vessel having taken her ashore at Paros to repair the iron clasp of 
her rudder, an opportunity occurred of examining their bellows. Mr. E. 
describes them as "a very antique device," consisting of " two sheepskins, 
united by an iron pipe introduced into the fire, which were alternately 
dilated with air and compressed, by an Arab slave who knelt above 
them." With the exception of their not being made of bull's hide but of 
sheepskin, he observes they would completely suit the description of the 
bellows given by Virgil in the Fourth Georgia Blacksmiths in Ceylon 
use the same kind, but made of bullocks' hides, and furnished with noz- 
zles of bamboo. The blower seats himself on the ground between the 
two bags, and works them with his hands, pulling up one and pushing 




No. 102. Primitive Bellows of Asia. 



Chap. 1.] 



Ancient Egyptian Bellows. 



237 



down the other. (See a figure in Davis' history of that island, and also 
in the Register of Arts, vol. i, 300.) The domestic bellows of Egypt is 
made in the same way, and probably has always been so : to it, Job most 
likely alluded, (chap, xx, 26.) "The ordinary hand bellows now 1 used 
for small fires in Egypt, (says Mr. Wilkinson) are a sort of bag made of 
the skin of a kid, with an opening at one end like the mouth of a common 
carpet bag, where the skin is sewed upon two pieces of wood; and these 
being pulled apart by the hands and closed again, the bag is pressed 
down and the air thus forced through the pipe at the other end." 

The next improvement seems to have been that by which the slit was 
superseded by a flap or clack, so as to be self-acting, as in the ordinary 
European or American bellows — in other words a valve, that opened by 
the pressure of the atmosphere when the bag was raised, and which was 
closed by its own weight or by the elasticity of the confined air. Among 
the interesting discoveries which recent examinations of Egyptian monu- 
ments have brought to light, figures of such bellows have been found 
sculptured in a tomb at Thebes, which bears the name of Thothmes III, 
one of the Pharaohs who was contemporary with Moses. No. 103 repre- 
sents four employed at one fire, each pair being worked by the hands and 
feet of a laborer, and in a manner singularly ingenious and effective ; prov- 
ing that the Egyptians of those times well knew how to combine muscu- 
lar energy with the weight of the body to produce a maximum effect. 




No. 103. Egyptian Bellows and Bellows Blowers. 1500 B. C. 

The bags were secured to frames or to the ground, and appear to have 
had rings of cane within them to keep the leather extended in a horizontal 
direction. A separate pipe proceeded from each to the fire. The valves 
or clacks are not shown because being placed underneath they were out 
of sight. In working them a laborer stood upon two, one under each 
foot, and taking two cords in his hands, the lower ends of which were 
secured to the top of the bags ; he alternately rested his weight 
upon each to expel the air, and inflated them when exhausted by pulling 
the cords ; thus the whole weight of his body was uninterruptedly em- 
ployed in closing one bellows, while the muscular force of his arms was 
incessantly engaged in opening another. We question if a more simple 
and efficient application of human effort can be produced. 

Such bellows were used in Egyptian kitchens, and were indeed neces- 
sary when the massive cauldrons and huge joints of meat boiled in them, 
are considered. 21 The same practice continued through the middle ages, 
in Europe, when 'bellows blowers' formed part of the establishment of 

•Wilkinson's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, vol. ii, 384. Vol. iii, 339 



238 Ancient Egyptian Bellows. [Book III, 

royal kitchens, and whose duty it was "to see that soup when on the fire 
was neither burnt nor smoked."* Among the relics that formerly be- 
longed to Gruy, the famous Earl of Warwick, is a cauldron or kitchen 
boiler, made of bell-metal, which contains 120 gallons, but whose capacity 
does not equal that of more ancient ones. b To the old custom of em- 
ploying persons exclusively at the bellows, as in the preceding cut, Vir- 
gil alludes in the following line: 

One stirs the fire and one the bellows blows. En. viii. 
Every modern bellows maker would be convinced from an inspection 
of the last figures, that valves were employed, since the instruments could 
not possibly have acted without them ; but all doubts respecting an ac- 
quaintance with the valve in those remote ages when the sculptures were 
executed, is removed by two other bellows portrayed in the same tomb, 
and shown in the next cut. These differ from the preceding and were 




No. 104. Egyptian Bellows in use before the Exodus. 

perhaps intended to show another variety of the instrument as made in 
those times. Their upper surfaces seem to have been of wood, in the 
centre of which, the orifices of the valves are distinctly shown; the valves 
or clacks were therefore inverted, as in our ordinary bellows turned up- 
side down. To persons not familiar with the subject, this circumstance 
might excite surprise, but the class to which these belong have almost al- 
ways had the valve in the moveable board ; and in whatever position they 
were used — whether horizontally as in these figures, or vertically as in 
the next. In Ceylon and other parts of the East they are used as shown 
in No. 104. 

But are not both bellows in the last cut double-acting, that is, impelling 
air from them both when moved up as well as when pushed down] From 
the figures it would seem that such were intended; for two pipes are rep- 
resented as proceeding from each, while one only is connected to those in 
No. 103 ; and one instrument was deemed sufficient to occupy one la- 
borer — to this there possibly may be an allusion in the knots on the ends 
of the cords, which, in the hieroglyphical language of Egypt may sig- 
nify the greater liability of slipping through the hands, in consequence 
of the superior force required to work them. Indeed four different bel- 
lows are represented. In No. 103, two are made of single bags, and two 
of double ones, as appears by the bands around them : and in No. 104, 
one is round like the lantern bellows, and the other oblong, both kinds of 
which are common at this day in the East; and both, as already re- 
marked, seem to be double acting like those of our smiths. 

This variety was probably designedly introduced into the sculptures to 
aid in conveying to posterity a knowledge of the state of the arts at that 
time in Egypt. The circumstance is an interesting one, and should lead 
to a more thorough examination of those wonderful, those eternal records 
of the arts and sciences of past ages, than has ever been given them; not 
only every group but every figure among the millions imprinted on these 

a Fosbroke's Encyc. Antiq. b Moule's English Counties, Lon. 1831. 



Chap. 1.] Lantern Bellows. 239 

imperishable pages, deserves not merely to be scrutinized, but accurately 
copied. Many of them are fraught with information of the highest in- 
terest to the arts; and whether the mass of hieroglyphical records be, ever 
understood or not, there is no difficulty in comprehending the most in- 
teresting of these. 

One of the figures in the last illustration is obviously a modification of 
the ?ld lantern bellows (so named from its resemblance to the paper 
lantern, still common in Egypt:) they consist of two circular boards 
united to the ends of a cylindrical bag of flexible leather. In the centre 
of one board is an opening covered by a flap opening inwards, and to the 
other the tuyere is attached. In working them, the board, through which 
the air is admitted, is moved, and the other kept stationary. They are 
quite common in Asia, Egypt, and generally throughout the oriental 
world; and appear to have undergone no change whatever, either in their 
materials, form, or modes of working them, since the remotest times: 
even working them by the feet, as practiced by Egyptians under the Pha- 
raohs, is still common at the native iron-forges of Ceylon. Dr. Davy in 
his account of that island has given a figure of them, a copy of which is 
inserted in the Register of Arts for 1828, page 267: the cords for raising 
them are attached to an elastic stick, instead of being held in the hands 
as in the two last cuts. 

They are used by modern blacksmiths of Egypt in a horizontal position, 
(as in the next figure) and worked by an upright lever, which the assist- 
ant pushes from and draws towards him. M. P. S. Grirard has given a 
figure and description of them in the Grande Description, torn, ii, E. M. 
p. 618, planche 21. He observes that the coppersmiths of Cairo and 
Alexandria use the same; and farther that they are common in the inte- 
rior of Africa: "leur forme est probablement tres ancienne. II resulte 
en effet de quelques reseignemens que m'ont donnes des marchands venus 
avec les caravanes de Darfour, que des soufflets de la meme forme sont 
employe par les peuples de Vinterieur de V Afrique" 

Lantern bellows were formerly common in Europe. They were em- 
ployed in old organs. See L'Art du Facteur d'Orgues, Arts et Metieres, 
p. 667, plates 132 and 135. Sometimes the blowers had their feet fixed 
upon the upper boards, and holding by a horizontal bar they inflated one 
bellows by raising one foot, and compressed the other by pushing down 
the other foot. (Encyc. Antiq.) The scabilla of the Romans were small 
bellows of the same kind, one of which was attached to one foot for the 
purpose of beating time, and with castanets were used to animate dancers. 
Several are figured by Montfaucon. The ancients varied the form of the 
bellows almost infinitely in adapting them to various purposes. Some 
were attached to altars to aid in the combustion of victims : one for this 
purpose is represented on one of the Hamilton vases. Lantern bellows 
were also common in European blast furnaces. No. 105 shows their ap- 
plication to this purpose, copied from the De Re Metallica of Agricola. 
Similar bellows, except the boards being of an oblong form like the one 
in 103, are common in Hindostan, and worked by hand as in the next 
figure, but without any frame to support them; the blower kneels and 
works them in nearly a vertical position. See a figure in Shoberl's Hin- 
dostan, vol. v, p. 9. 

The bellows of Vulcan were probably of the same kind. Those repre- 
sented in torn, i, p. 24, of Montfaucon's Antiquities, appear, from that 
portion of them which is seen projecting from the back of the forge, to 
be identical with those in No. 105, and worked in precisely the same 
way. In plate xx, on Painting, of D'Agincourt's History of the Fine 



240 



Blacksmith's Bellows of Ancient Greece. [Book III. 



Arts, which contains some illustrations of the Eneid, executed in the 4th 
and 5th centuries, Vulcan's forge is represented and the bellows blower 
behind it, apparently with the same kind of instrument as here shown. 




No. 105. Lantern Bellows from Agncola 

That Vulcan's bellows were not permanent fixtures as those of our 
smiths are, but were similar to those figured above, appears from their 
having been laid aside when not in use, in common with other implements 
of the forge ; a practice usual at the present time in various parts of 
the east : and we may add that like modern blacksmiths of Asia, he sat at 
work. Thus, when his wife Charis informed him of the arrival of Thetis 
at their dwelling, he replied : — 

Haste, then, and hospitably spread the board 

For her regale, while with my best despatch 

I lay my beUoios and my tools aside. 

He spake, and vast in bulk and hot with toil, 

Rose limping from his anvil-stock, 

Upborne with pain on legs tortuous and weak : 

First, from the forge dislodg'd he thrust apart 

His bellows, and his tools collecting all, 

Bestowed them careful in a silver chest. 

And when he subsequently returned to make the armor which Thetis 
required for her son, he 



to his bellows quick repaired, 

Which turning to the fire, he bade them move. — //. xvin.- 



■Coioper. 



A singular circumstance is related by Herodotus, which shows that the 
same mode of obtaining a continuous blast, viz. by two bellows, (and in all 
probability by the same kind as those above figured) was employed by 
blacksmiths in ancient Greece. The Lacedemonians having been repeat- 
edly defeated by the Tegeans, sent an embassy to the Delphic oracle, to 
ascertain the means by which they could overcome them. The Pythian 
assured them of success if they recovered the body of Orestes, the son 
of Agamemnon, which had been buried several centuries somewhere in 
Arcadia, the land of their enemies. Being unable to discover the tomb 
they sent a second time to inquire concerning the place of his interment, 
when they received the following answer* 



Chap. 1.] 



Bellotvs Forcing Pumps. 



241 



A plain within th' Arcadian land I know, 
Where double winds with forced exertion blow, 
Where form to form with mutual strength replies, 
And ill by other ills supported lies; 
That earth contains the great Atrides' son; 
Take him and conquer : Tegea then is won. 

On the receipt of this, search was again made for the body without inter- 
mission, and at last it was discovered in a singular manner. At the time a 
commercial intercourse existed between the two countries, a Spartan cav- 
alry officer, named Lichas, being in Tegea, happened to visit a smith at his 
forge, and observing with particular curiosity the process of working the 
iron, the smith desisted from his labor and addressed him thus: "Stranger 
of Sparta, you seem to admire the art which you contemplate; but how 
much more would your wonder be excited, if you knew all that I am able 
to communicate ! Near this place, as I was sinking a well, I found a 
coffin seven cubits long. I never believed that men were formerly of 
larger dimensions than at present, but when I opened it, I discovered a 
body equal in length to the coffin — I correctly measured it, and placed it 
where I found it." Lichas, after hearing this relation, was induced to 
believe that this might be the body of Orestes, concerning which the 
oracle had spoken. He was further persuaded, when he recollected 
that the bellows of the smith might intimate the two wi?ids; the anvil and 
the hammer might express one form opposing another; the iron also, 
which was beaten, might signify ill succeeding ill, rightly conceiving that 
the use of iron operated to the injury of mankind. The result proved 
the sagacity of the Spartan : the body was recovered, and finally the 
Tegeans, says Herodotus, were conquered. Clio, 67, 68. 




No. 106. Double Lantern Bellows Pump. 



No. 107. Single Forcing Pump. 



The application of lantern bellows as forcing pumps is, without doubt, 
of great antiquity : their adaptation to raise water was too obvious not to 
have been early perceived, and hence we infer that they were at least oc- 
casionally employed for that purpose by most of the nations of old. Such 
pumps are mentioned in old works on hydraulics ; but as they have never 

31 



242 Bellows Forcing Pumps. [Book III 

come into general use, even in modern times, a particular account of them 
previous to the art of printing, is not to be expected. A writer in the 
Grande Description of Egypt, describing the smith's bellows of that coun- 
try, observes : — " Ces sortes de soufflets etoient employes verticalement 
dans le seizieme siecle tant pour animer le feu des forges que pour clever 
V eau, soit en rarefiant l'air soit en le comprimant ; ils sont decrits dans 
1'ouvrage de Ramelli, imprime en 1558." 

No. 106 represents a double lantern bellows-pump, as used in the 16th 
century. The mode of its operation is too obvious to require detailed 
description. As one bellows is distended by working the lever, the at- 
mosphere drives water up the suction-pipe into its cavity ; and the other 
at the same time being compressed, expels its contents through the 
ascending or forcing pipe : the valves at the lower part of the latter, and 
those over the orifices of the two branches of the suction-pipe opening and 
closing, as shown in the figure. There is a pump similar to this, but 
geared in a different manner,in Hachette's Traite elementaire des machi^ 
nes. Papin, in a way to raise water, which he proposed enigmatically 
in the Philosophical Transactions in 16S5, used the lantern bellows as a 
forcing-pump. In a solution by another writer, it is said : — " A vessel 
made like the body of a pair of bellows, or those puffs heretofore used by 
barbers being filled with water, a piece of clockwork put under it, may 
produce the jets." Phil. Trans. Abridg., vol. i. 539. A similar appli- 
cation of the bellows was described in Besson's Theatre, in 1579, the 
moveable board being impelled by a spring. 

No. 107 is another example of bellows forcing-pumps. It consists 
©f the frictionless piston of Gosset and Deville, (No. S3,) but without a 
valve ; a forcing or ascending pipe, having its lower orifice covered by a 
valve, is attached to the cylinder below the jpiston. Pumps of this kind 
have also been made double acting, by passing the piston rod through a 
stuffing box on the top of the cylinder, and by a double set of valves 
arranged as in the pump of La Hire. 

Of late years machines like those figured in the two last cuts, have been 
reintroduced into Europe and this country. 

Although we have not heard of any one having run out of his wits for 
joy at their discovery, like the blacksmith mentioned by Cardan, we have 
heard of some who were nearly in that predicament from disappointment 
in having found themselves anticipated. A few years ago they were an- 
nounced in this city as a new and very important discovery ; and several 
gentlemen allowed their names to go abroad as vouchers of their origina- 
lity and superiority over the common pump. 

The proofs of the antiquity of many of our ordinary utensils are derived 
from representations of them on vases, candelabra, and other works of 
art that have come down. Of this, the domestic bellows is an example ; 
the only evidence of its having been known to the Greeks or Romans, 
is furnished by a lamp ; but for the preservation of which, it might have 
been deemed a modern invention. Of no other article of ancient house- 
hold furniture are more specimens extant than of lamps, and not a little of the 
public and private economy of the ancients has been illustrated by them. 
Amo'ig those in private collections and public museums, are some that 
were once suspended in temples, others that illuminated theatres and 
baths — that decorated the banqueting-rooms of wealthy patricians, as well 
as such as glimmered in the dwellings of plebeians; the former are of 
bronze, elaborately wrought and enriched, the latter mostly of earthen- 
ware. The fertility of conception displayed in these utensils is wonderful. 
All nature seems to have been ransacked for devices, and in modifying 



Chap. 1.] 



Bellows Pumps from Kircher. 



243 



them, the imaginations of the designers ran perfectly wild ; while many 
are in their forms and decorations exquisitely chaste, others are bizarre 
and «ome are obscene. There is one of bronze on which an individual is 
represented blowing the flame with his mouth, as in the act of kindling a 
fire ; and in another the artist has introduced, as an appropriate embellish- 
ment, a person performing the same operation with a pair of bellows, of 
precisely the same form as those in our kitchens. No. 108 is a figure of 
this lamp, from the 5th volume of Montfaucon's Antiquities. 




103. Bellows figured on a Roman Lamp. 



No. 109. Bellows Forcing Pumps fiom Kircher. 



An example of the application of such bellows as atmospheric pumps 
has already been given, page* 207. The adjoining figure (No. 109) is copied 
from Kircher's Mundus Subterraneus, torn, i., p. 230, Amsterdam, 1665 : 
it represents two large bellows employed as sucking and forcing pumps, 
being worked by a water wheel, to the axis of which the crank repre 
sented was attached. 

Bellows like the last and worked in a similar manner, were among an- 
cient devices for ventilating mines : the various modes of adapting them 
to the purpose may be adduced as another example of their analogy to 
pumps. Sometimes they were used to force down fresh air in sufficient 
quantities to render the impure and stagnant atmosphere below respira- 
ble ; at others they drew the foul air up. In the first case, they were 
placed near the mouth of the shaft, a pipe was attached to the nozzle and 
continued down to the place where the miners worked, and when the bel- 
lows were put in motion, currents of fresh air were supplied. In the 
latter case, the pipe was connected to the opening in the under board, i. e. 
to the aspirating valve, through which the impure air was drawn, and 
then expelled out of the nozzle ; but in this case an expiring valve was 
required in the nozzle, opening outwards to prevent air from entering 
through it when the bellows were again distended. The same result was 
sometimes obtained in the following manner : An opening was made and 
covered by a valve in the upper board instead of the lower one, and 
when the bellows were distended, the impure air rushed up the pipe 
which was attached to the nozzle, and was expelled through the opening 
covered by the flap when the bellows were closed. Several figures re- 
presenting these and other applications of bellows are given by Agricola. 
Goguet observes that draft furnaces were probably invented early, 
but bellows were not. We should suppose the reverse was the fact ; for 
the advantages of an artificial blast must have been obvious from the firs* 



244 



Piston Bellows. 



[Book III. 



use of fire, and naturally led to the use of the mouth to blow it, then the 
reed, sack, and subsequently a slit or valve in the latter, would follow as 
an almost necessary sequence ; and long before the idea of increasing the 
intensity of heat by flues or chimneys could have been thought of. No 
natural occurrence could have led to the invention of these before the 
other, nor has there, as yet, been found any account or representation of 
draft furnaces of equal antiquity with those of bellows. 



CHAPTER II. 

Piston Bellows : Used in water organs — Engraved on a medal of Valentinian — Used in Asia and 
Africa. Bellows of Madagascar. Chinese bellows : Account of two in the Philadelphia Museum — 
Remarks on a knowledge of the pump among the ancient Chinese — Chinese bellows similar in their 
construction to the water-forcer of Ctesibius, the double acting pump of La Hire, the cylindrical steam- 
engine, and condensing and exhausting air-pumps. Double acting bellows of Madagascar — Alledged 
ignorance of the old Peruvian and Mexican smiths of bellows : Their constant use of blowing tubes no 
proof of this — Example* from Asiatic gold and silver smiths — Balsas — Sarbacans— Mexican Vulcan. 
Natural bellows-pumps: Blowing apparatus of the whale — Elephant — Rise and descent of marine ani- 
mals — Jaculator fish — Llama — Spurting Snake — Lamprey — Bees — The heart of man and animals — Every 
human being a living pump : Wonders of its mechanism, and of the duration of its motions and materials 
— Advantages of studying the mechanism of animals. 

The bellows described in the last chapter are all formed of le*ather or 
skins, and are obvious modifications of the primitive bag or sack ; the 
wooden ends of some of them being adopted merely to facilitate their 
distension and collapsion. From the simplicity of their construction and 

general efficiency they still retain a 
place in our workshops and dwell- 
ings, and are in no danger of being 
replaced by modern substitutes : 
but the ingenuity of ancient bellows 
makers was not exhausted on these, 
for they had others, differing both 
in form, materials and mode of ac- 
tion ; viz : piston bellows; machines 
identical with cylindrical forcing- 
pumps. At what time these were 
first devised we have no account ; 
but as they are described by Vitru- 
vius, in his account of hydraulic or- 
gans, without the slightest intima- 
tion of their being then of recent 
date, they may safely be classed 
among those inventions, the origin 
of which is too remote to be dis- 
covered. 

No. 110 represents a person work- 
ing two of them to supply wind for 
a water organ, from Barbaro's Vi- 
truvius, Venice, 1567. They are sub- 
stantially the same as those figured 
by Perrault and Newton in their 
translations, and by Kircher in his Musurgia Universalis, (torn, ii, 332.) 




No. 110. Roman Piston Bellows. 



Chap. 2.] Piston Bellows of Mindanao. 245 

The blower, by alternately raising one piston and depressing the other, 
•pumped air into a large reservoir : this was an open vessel inverted 
into another containing water, and as the air accumulated in the former, 
the liquid was gradually displaced and rose in the latter, as in a gas 
holder. It was the constant pressure exerted by this displaced water 
that urged the air through the pipes of the organ, whenever the valves for 
its admission were opened. The question, perhaps may be asked, Why 
did the ancients prefer these bellows in their organs to those formed of 
leather and boards, such as are figured at Nos. 105, 108, 109 ] Probably 
because the pressure required to be overcome in forcing air into the reser- 
voirs was greater than the form and materials of the latter could safely 
bear. It is very obvious from the brief description of the piston bellows 
of the Romans, that they were calculated to produce much stronger blasts 
than could be obtained from those made of leather. Vitruvius informs us 
that the cylinders and valves were made of brass, and the pistons were 
accurately turned and covered (or packed) with strips of unshorn sheep- 
skins. They seem to have been perfect condensing air-pumps. 

A figure of an ancient hydraulic organ is preserved on a medal of Val- 
entinian : two men, one on each side, are represented as pumping and 
listening to its music. This medal is engraved in the third volume of 
Montfaucon's Antiquities, (plate 26,) but the piston rods only are in sight ; 
the top of the cylinders being level with the base on which the blowers 
stand. 

As piston bellows were known in the old world, it might be supposed 
they would still be employed in those parts of the East where the arts 
and customs of former ages have been more or less religiously retained. 
Such is the fact ; for like other devices of ancient common life, they are 
used by several of the half civilized tribes of Asia and Africa — people, 
among whom we are sure to meet with numerous primitive contrivances, 
embodied in the same rude forms and materials as they were before 
Grecian taste or Roman skill improved them. It is chiefly to the in- 
cidental observations of a few travelers that we are indebted for a know- 
ledge of these implements in modern days ; but when the times arrive 
for voyages of discovery to be undertaken for the purpose of describing 
the machines, manufactures and domestic utensils of the various nations 
of the earth ; (undertakings of equal importance with any other,) these 
bellows and their numerous modifications will furnish materials for a chap- 
ter in the history of the useful arts that will be replete with interesting 
information. As they are clearly identified with the forcing-pump, an 
account of some of them will not be out of place. 

Dampier thus describes the bellows used by the blacksmiths of Min- 
danao. " They are made of a wooden cylinder, the trunk of a tree, about 
three feet long, bored hollow like a pump, and set upright on the ground ; 
on which the fire itself is made. Near the lower end there is a small hole 
in the side of the trunk next the fire made to receive a pipe ; through 
which the wind is driven to the fire by a great bunch of fine feathers, 
fastened to one end of a stick, which closing up the inside of the cylinder, 
drives the air out of the cylinder through the pipe. Two of these trunks, 
or cylinders, are placed so nigh together, that a man standing between 
them may work them both at once, one with each hand." a Here we have 
both the single and double chambered forcing-pump ; and although Dam- 
pier has not noticed the valves, the instruments were certainly furnished 
with them, or with some contrivance analogous to them, but being out of 

a Dampier's Voyages, i. 332. 



246 



Piston Bellows of Madagascar, 



[Book IIL 



sight, were left unnoticed by that intelligent sailor. The bellows of Mada- 
gascar, says Sonnerat, " is composed of the hollow trunks of two trees 
tied together. In the bottom there are two iron funnels, and in the inside 
of each trunk a sucker furnished with raffia, which supplies the place of 
tow. The apprentice, whose business it is to use this machine, alternately 
sinks one of the suckers while he raises the other." b Similar implements 
are also used in smelting iron as well as in forging it. In the first volume 
of Ellis's " History of Madagascar," Lon. 1838, there is a representation 
of two men reducing iron ore by means of four piston bellows. No. Ill 
is a copy. 




No. 111. Piston Bellows of Madagascar. 

The furnace is described as a mere hole dug in the ground, lined with 
rude stonework and plastered with clay. It was filled with alternate 
layers of charcoal and ore, and covered by a conical roof of clay, a small 
opening being left at the apex. The bellows were formed of the trunks 
of trees, and stood five feet above the ground, in which they were firmly 
imbedded. The lower ends were closed " air tight," and a short bamboo 
tube conveyed the wind from each to the fire, as represented. " A rude 
sort of piston is fitted to each of the cylinders, and the apparatus for rais- 
ing the wind is complete." As no mention is made of valves nor of the 
openings through which air entered the cylinders, it is probable that the 
pistons were perforated for that purpose, and the passages covered by 
flaps or valves opening downwards, a device which the artificers of 
Madagascar are acquainted with. See No. 114. These bellows are of 
various sizes, though generally from 4 to 6 inches in diameter. Sometimes 
only one is used, but it is then made of larger dimensions, and the blower 
ttands and works it with both his hands. To do it conveniently, he raises 
himself on a bank of earth. The bellows are not always perpendicular, 
but are inclined as figured in the back ground of the cut. 



b Sonnerat's Voyages, iii. 36. 



Chap. 2.] Southern Asia and Western Africa. 247 

The blacksmiths of Java use the same kind. Raffles, in his History of 
the Island, (2 vol. 193,) after quoting Dampier's description of the bel- 
lows of Mindanao, observes his account "exactly corresponds", with 
that of Java. "The blacksmiths' bellows of Sumatra," says Mr. Marsden, 
" are thus constructed : two bamboos of about four inches diameter and 
five feet in length, stand perpendicularly near the fire, open at the 
upper end and stopped below. About an inch or two from the bottom a 
small joint of bamboo is inserted into each, which serve as nozzles, point- 
ing to and meeting at the fire. To produce a stream of air, bunches of 
feathers, or other soft substance, are worked up and down in the upright 
tubes like the piston of a pump. These, when pushed downwards, force 
the air through the small horizontal tubes ; and by raising and sinking 
each alternately, a continual current of air is kept up." c The Bashee 
Islanders use the same kind of bellows. d The smiths of Bali have them 
also : " their instruments are few and simple, their forge small, and 
worked by a pair of upright bellows, such as we find described in Raf- 
fles' Java." e They are not confined to southern Asia and the Ethiopian 
Archipelago, but are used in continental Africa. " The bellows of the 
negro artificers on the Gambia, are a thick reed or a hollow piece of wood, 
in which is put a stick wound about with feathers, [a piston,] which by 
moving of the stick, makes the wind."* 

Without entering into the controversy respecting the origin of wooden 
bellows, it may be inferred from the preceding extracts, that such have 
been in use from remote times ; and that the cylindrical forcing-pump, so 
far as regards the principle of its construction, is equally ancient: of this, 
the instrument now to be described, affords another indication. It is the 
bellows of the most numerous and most singular of all existing people — 
a people, the wisdom of whose government has preserved them as a na- 
tion, through periods of time unexampled in the history of the world, and 
which still preserves them amidst the prostration by European cupidity of 
nearly all the nations around them ; a people, too, who notwithstanding 
all that our vanity may suggest to depreciate, have furnished evidence of 
an excellence in some of the arts that never has been surpassed. The 
Chinese, like the ancient Egyptians, whom they greatly resemble, have 
been the instructors of Europeans in several of the useful arts; but the pu- 
pils, like the Greeks of old, have often refused to acknowledge the source 
whence many inventions possessed by them were derived, but have 
claimed them as their own : of the truth of this remark, we need only 
mention 'printing, the mariner's compass, and gunpowder. 

In the bellows of the Chinese, we perceive the characteristic ingenuity 
and originality of that people's inventions. A description and figure of their 
bellows were published in London, 1757, by Mr. Chambers, in a work en- 
titled " Designs of Chinese Buildings, Furniture, Dresses, Machines and 
Utensils, from drawings made in China." The following account from 
the fourth volume of the " Chinese Repository," a very interesting work 
published at Canton in China, is substantially the same. " The bellows 
used by them is very aptly called ' Fung Seeing, ' wind box,' and is 
contained in an oblong box about two feet long, ten inches high, and six 
inches wide. These dimensions, however, vary according to the whim of 
the maker, and they occur from eight inches, to four feet or more in length, 
and so of the width and height. The annexed profile view will give 
some idea of the principle upon which it is constructed." 

c History of Sumatra, p. 181. d Dampier's Voyages, i. 429. e Chinese Repository^ 
iv. 455. f Ogilvy's Africa, Lon. 1670, p. 356. 



248 



Chinese Bellows. 



[Book III. 



U 



J3\ 



" A, B, C, D, is a box divided into two chambers at the line O H. In 
the upper one is the piston E, which is moved backwards and forwards 
by means of the handles attached to it; and is made to fit closely by 
A B means of leather or paper. 

The lid of the box slides 
upon the top, and is suffi- 
ciently thick to allow the 
workman to labor upon it. 
At F J are two small 
holes each covered with a 
valve ; and just below 
them, at O H in the divi- 
for the entrance of the 
the bellows is made of a 
and is about an inch thick. 



¥ 



J'fej. 



¥ 






No. 112. Section of a Chinese Bellows. 



sion of the two chambers, are larger holes, 
wind into the lower chamber. This part of 
thick plank, hollowed into an ovoid form, 
The clapper G is fastened to the back side of the box, and plays hori- 
zontally against the two stops placed near the mouth I. It is made as 
high as the chamber, and when forced against the stop, it entirely closes 
the passage of air beyond. When the piston is forced inwards, as repre- 
sented in the cut, the valve at F is closed, and that at J is opened ; and 
thus the upper chamber is constantly filled with air. The wind driven 
into the lower chamber by the piston urges the clapper G against the 
stop, and is consequently forced out at the mouth. The stream of air is unin- 
terrupted, but not equable, though in the large ones the inequality is hardly 
perceived. An iron tube is sometimes attached to the mouth which leads 
to the furnace, and in other cases the mouth itself is made of iron." The 
Chinese generally use them in an inclined or horizontal position, frequently 
making use of the upper side as a work bench. In the figure (and the 
one given by Chambers) two rods are connected to the piston to prevent 
it from springing when used : this appears to be the practice with regard 
to those of large dimensions. In small ones a single rod is sometimes used, 
and the chamber is cylindrical. In the collection of M. Bertin, (a French 
minister and secretary of state in the former part of the last century,) 
which contained " about 400 original drawings, made at Pekin, of the 
arts and manufactures of China " a portable and single-acting bellows is 
represented as in the next figure. a 

" This instrument is 
made like a box in 
which is a piston, so 
constructed that when 
it is drawn out behind, 
the vacuum which it oc- 
casions in the box makes 
the air rush in with great 
impetuosity through a 
lateral opening, to which 
a sucker [a valve] is af- 
fixed : and when the pis- 
ton returns in an inverse 
direction, the sucker 

No. 113. Chinese Single Bellows, and Tinker. [valve] closes itself, and 

the air is forced out by the opposite extremity." Navarette preferred the 




* China, its Customs, Arts, &c, translated from the French. Lon. 1824 ; vol. i. 17. 



Chap. 2.] Chinese Bellows in the Philadelphia Museum. 249 

Chinese bellows to the European one, he said it was more commodious 
and efficient. 5 It is employed to some extent in Java, having been intro- 
duced from China. c 

Since the preceding remarks were written, we have examined two 
bellows from China, in the splendid "Chinese Collection" in Philadelphia. 
One of them belonged to a traveling blacksmith. It is formed of a cylin- 
drical joint of bamboo, 2j feet in length, and between five and six inches 
diameter. The piston rod is a wire J or f of an inch thick, with a small 
gimlet handle. Air is admitted through a cluster of five or six small holes 
in each end, which are covered in the inside by paper flaps : these are the 
induction valves, marked J F in No. 112. Along one side of the bellows 
a strip of wood 2% inches wide and lj thick, is secured by what appears 
to be eight small thumb screws, and the junction made tight by cement or 
wax ; this projecting piece resembles those on the sides of high pressure 
steam-engine cylinders, and is intended for a somewhat similar purpose, its 
interior being hollowed into a passage for the wind when expelled by the 
piston from either end of the cylinder. A short metallic tube conveys 
the wind from the middle of this piece to the furnace as in No. 112. The 
ends of the bellows are secured from splitting by two thin and narrow 
iron hoops, and at one place a small clamp is driven across a crack, as is 
sometimes practiced in mending wooden bowls. The instrument resem- 
bles the one in the last figure, but is double acting : the figure of the artist 
accompanying it is seated on the ground and works it with one hand while 
he attends the fire with the other. 

The other bellows consists of a long box like the one figured at No. 112. 
From the circumstance of its not being confined in a glass case, and per- 
mission to examine its interior having been politely accorded, we had an 
opportunity of ascertaining some particulars that are not mentioned in any 
published account of these instruments that has fallen in our way. It is 
twenty-two inches long, seven deep, and five wide, made of thin boards 
of a species of fir and extremely light : the sides and ends are dovetailed 
together ; and the bottom appeared to be intended to slide over the sides, 
having strips projecting from it and no pins or nails visible ; this arrange- 
ment enables a person to examine the interior, and to replace or repair the 
valves, &c. with great facility. The boards of which the machine is made 
are of a uniform thickness (about f of an inch) except the top, which is 
l|r inches. The reason for this extra thickness was perceived as soon as 
it was removed, (it was secured to the sides and ends by long wooden 
pins,) for a deep and wide groove is made through its whole length with 
the exception of ^ of an inch at each end, and at the middle of the groove 
a passage is cut at right angles to it through one side for the air to pass 
into the tuyere. Upon the removal of this thick cover, the inside of the 
box was not exposed, for another thin one was found inserted within the 
sides, and flush with their edges. This was a board slipped between the 
sides and resting upon the upper edge of the piston, having two openings, 
one at each end, which coincided with the groove in the outer cover, (the 
inner cover is represented by the line H O in No. 112 ;) hence the wind 
is driven by the piston alternately through each opening into the groove, 
and by the action of the valve in the middle of the latter, is compelled 
to pass into the tuyere. This valve is represented at G in No. 112, 
and from an inspection of that cut, it will be apparent that some contri- 
vance of the kind is absolutely necessary, in order to prevent the wind 
when forced from one end of the bellows, from passing along the groove 

b Histoire Generate, Tom. viii. 106. <= Raffles' Java, ii. 193. 

31 



250 Analogy between the Pump and Chinese Bellows. [Book III. 

into the other end : it consists of a narrow piece of hard wood of the same 
depth as the groove, and of a length that rather exceeds the width of 
the groove. A hole is drilled through one end and a pin driven through 
it into the solid part of the cover, so that it turns freely on this pin, and 
closes and opens a passage for the escape of the wind into the tuyere. It 
is driven by the wind at every stroke of the piston against the opposite 
cheek of the groove, and thus prevents the wind from passing into the 
other end of the cylinder, as shown at Gr in No. 112. It is surprising how 
easily this valve plays although its upper and lower edges rub against the 
surfaces of the two covers — a trifling movement o£ the piston drives it 
against the cheek, and occasions a snapping sound somewhat like that 
from the contact of metal. 

When the inner cover was raised out of its place, the piston and induc- 
tion valves were exposed to view, and the simplicity and efficiency of 
these parts were in keeping with the rest : the two valves are mere flaps 
of paper, glued at their lower edges to the under side of the openings, 
and hence they stand nearly perpendicular, instead of being suspended from 
above ; the slightest impulse of air closed them. The piston is half an 
inch thick, but is reduced at the edges to a quarter of one ; it appears to 
be formed of two thin pieces which, united, are equal in thickness to that 
mentioned ; and between them are inserted two small sheets of moderately 
stiff paper, which project an inch over every side. The part that pro- 
jects is folded at the corners and turned over the edges of the piston ; 
one sheet being turned one way, and the other the contrary, so that when 
the piston is moved, the air presses the paper against the sides of the bel- 
lows and renders the piston perfectly tight, on the same principle as the 
double cuj3ped leathers of fire-engines and other forcing-pumps ; and at 
the same time without any perceptible increase of friction. The two pis- 
ton rods are half inch square, and work through holes in one end of the 
box without any stuffing-box. The whole machine is of wood, except 
the paper for the piston and valves. Although the instrument appears to 
be a rectangular box, it is not exactly so, the bottom being a little wider 
than the top. 

It would be superfluous to point out the application of piston bellows to 
raise water, since they are perfect models of our atmospheric and forcing- 
pumps. Why, then, it may be asked are not the Chinese found in the 
possession of the latter 1 In reply to this question, it may be observed : 1. 
That from our imperfect knowledge of the people, it is not certain that 
such machines have not been, and are not used to a limited extent in the 
interior of that great empire. 2. That custom, and probably experience, 
have induced them, in common with other nations of the Oriental world, 
to give the preference to more simple devices — to their chain pump, bam- 
boo wheel, &c, a preference which we know is in some instances based 
on solid grounds : for example, the chain pump as used by them, raises 
more water with the same amount of labor, than any atmospheric or forc- 
ing-pump, if placed under the same circumstances. And as for the noria 
or bamboo wheel, which driven by a current, raises water night and day, 
and from 20 to 50 feet, we are told that it answers the purpose "as com- 
pletely as the most complicated European machine could do; and I will 
answer for it [says Van Braam] that it does not occasion an expense of 
ten dollars." 3. A circumstance connected with one of their ancient as well 
as modern scenic representations, shows that when the forcing or spouting 
of water is required, their artists are at no loss for devices to effect it; and 
that, too, under very unusual circumstances. One of the pantomimes per- 
formed at Pekin is the " Marriage of the Sea with the Land." The 



Chap. 2.] Antiquity of the Chinese Bellows. 251 

latter divinity made a display of his wealth and productions, such as dra- 
gons, elephants, tigers, eagles, ostriches, chestnut and pine trees, &c. 
The Ocean, on the other hand, collected whales, dolphins, porpoises and 
other sea monsters, together with ships, rocks, shells, &c, " all these ob- 
jects were represented by performers concealed under cloths, and who 
played their parts admirably. The two assemblages of productions, ter- 
restrial and marine, made the tour of the stage, and then opened right and 
left to leave room for an immense whale, which placed itself directly 
before the emperor, and spouted out several hogsheads of tcater, which 
inundated the spectators who were in the pit." a As both the water and 
forcing apparatus were contained within the moving figure, we can only 
imagine the jets to have been produced by means of piston or bellows 
forcing-pumps, or something analogous to them — or by air condensed in 
one or more vessels containing water, like soda fountains. 4. If Chinese 
lads never discovered a source of amusement in the application of their 
bellows (some of which are only eight inches long) as squirts or pumps, 
they must differ essentially from lads of other nations — a position that few 
judges of human nature would admit. Boys are the same in all ages, and 
the mischievous youngsters of the Celestial Empire have doubtless 
often derived as much pleasure from annoying one another with water 
ejected from these implements, as those of Europe and this country do 
with similar devices. Such an application of them was sure to be found 
out by boys, if by no one else. Whether the bellows-pump originated 
in this manner or not, may be uncertain, but several useful discoveries 
have been brought to light in much the same way : it was a youth who 
changed the whole character of the steam-engine, by giving it that feature 
upon which its general utility depends — his ingenuity, stimulated by a 
love of play, rendered it self-acting. 

The antiquity of the Chinese bellows is a subject of much interest. It 
may have been the instrument which Anacharsis introduced into Greece, it 
having, perhaps, been employed by his countrymen, the ancient Scythians, 
as well as by their descendants, the modern Tartars. If it has been in 
use, as supposed, from times anterior to Grecian and Roman eras, the 
origin of the pump in the second century B. C. can hardly be sustained; 
for when the induction valves of one of these bellows are placed in water, 
(as we suppose has occasionally been done ever since its invention,) it is 
then the "water forcer" of Ctesibius ; and if pipes be connected to F and 
J, (No. 112,) and their orifices placed in a liquid, the apparatus becomes 
the double acting pump of La Hire. But what may be surprising to some 
persons, its construction is identical with that of the steam-engine ; for let 
it be furnished with a crank and fly wheel to regulate the movements of 
its piston, and with apparatus to open and close its valves, then admit 
steam through its nozzle, and it becomes the double acting engine of Boul- 
ton and Watt. Again, connect its induction orifices to a receiver, and it 
becomes an exhausting air-pump ; apply its nozzle to the same vessel, and 
it is a condensing one. The most perfect blowing machine, and the chef 
d'aeuvre of modern modifications of the pump, are also its fac-similes. 

It would seem that the Chinese have other kinds of bellows, or differ- 
ent modes of working these. Bell, in his account of the Russian embassy 
in 1720, says that he was lodged in a village twelve miles from Pekin in 
a cook's house, which gave him an opportunity of observing the customs of 
the people even on trifling occasions : " My landlord," he observes, "be- 
ing in his shop, I paid him a visit, where I found six kettles placed in a 

a China, its Costumes, &c, Hi. 34. 



252 



Double acting Bellows of Madagascar. 



[Book IIL 



row on furnaces, having a separate opening under each of them for re- 
ceiving the fuel, which consisted of a few small sticks and straw. On 
Ids pulling a thong, he blew a pair of bellows which made all his kettles 
boil in a very short time." Like other Asiatics, the Chinese have proba- 
bly a variety of these instruments. The van, or winnowing machine, 
which we have received from them, is a rotary bellows. See page 70 
of this volume. 

Various rotary bellows are described by Agricola, as employed in the 
ventilation of mines, and worked by men with cranks, and in one instance 
by a horse treading on the periphery of a wheel. d Rotary blowing 
machines have been represented as of more recent origin, but they are in 
all probability of great antiquity. The Spaniards introduced them into 
Peru as early as 1545, to reduce the silver ores, but they were soon aban- 
doned. 6 For rotary pumps, see a subsequent chapter of this book. 

We are indebted for some interesting information respecting the arts of 
various islanders of the Indian ocean to Mr. William Clark of Philadel 
phia, who, besides spending several years in whaling voyages, resided 
two years in Southern Africa. The vessel to which he was attached hav- 
ing on one occasion touched on the coast of Madagascar, some native 
smiths were found using bellows that excited particular attention ; some 
were cylindrical, being formed of bored logs, others were square trunks, 
five or six inches in diameter, and about five feet long ; but the internal 
construction of both was the same. The ship's carpenter was permitted 
to open one. It was composed of four planks that had been split from 
trees, the insides shaved smooth and straight, and the whole put together 
with wooden pins instead of nails or screws. It was divided into two 
parts by a partition or disk, which was permanently secured in its place, 
(shown at A in the annexed cut,) where, like a piston, it occupied the 
entire space across. On one side of the trunk, and 
opposite the edge of A, an opening was made for 
the insertion of the tube C that conveyed the wind 
to the fire, the edge of A at this place being feather- 
ed, and a small projecting piece added to it, in 
order to direct the current of air from either side 
of the partition into C. An opening was made in 
the centre of A, through which a smooth piston 
rod B, played ; two pistons or boards, P P, accu- 
rately fitted to work in the trunk, were attached 
on opposite sides of the partition to B ; these pis- 
tons were perforated, and the openings covered by 
flaps or valves like those of a common pump box, 
but the upper one was secured to the under side 
of the piston as shown in the figure. The trunk 
rested on four short pieces of wood pegged to it. 
In some, holes were made at the lower part for 
the admission of air. These bellows were there- 
fore double acting, and consequently one of them 
was equal in its effects to two of those represented 
at No. Ill, which drive the air out only on the de- 
scent of the piston, whereas these forced it into the 
fire both on ascending and descending. Thus, 
when the blower raised the rod B, the flap on the 
lower piston closed, and the air in that division of 

* Bell's Travels, i. 312. d De Re Metallica, pp. 162, 163, 164, 169. e Garcilasso's 
Commentaries, p. 347. 




No. 114. Double Acting Bel 
lows of Madagascar. 



Chap. 2.] On the Bellows among the Peruvians. 253 

the trunk was expelled through C ; at the same time the flap of the upper 
piston was opened by its own weight and the air passing through it, and 
on the descent of B all the air in the upper part of the trunk was forced 
into the fire in like manner; hence an uninterrupted, though not an equable 
blast of wind was kept up. The whole apparatus was of wood except 
the flaps, which were pieces of green hide rendered pliable by working 
them in the hands ; and they were prevented from opening too far by 
narrow slips of the same material pegged over them. There was no 
packing to the pistons, but they were moved with great rapidity. 

These bellows are different from those described by Dampier, Sonnerat 
and Ellis, as used in the same island ; but they serve to corroborate a re- 
mark that has been made by several travelers, viz : that the negroes of 
Africa are in possession of a great variety of those instruments. The one 
above described is a fine specimen of their ingenuity, for there can be little 
doubt that it is original with them — it evidently is not derived from the 
double acting bellows of China, nor can it have been procured from Europe, 
since nothing of the kind has, we believe, ever been used there. It is the 
only bellows that we have met with having valves in the pistons. 

It need hardly be observed that double pumps have been made on the 
same principle. There is one figured by Belidor in the second volume ot 
his Architecture Hydraulique, which differs from the above figure only in 
having two short piston rods connected together by a frame on the outside 
of the cylinder, instead of one long one working through the disk. 

No stronger proofs could possibly be adduced of the analogy between 
pumps and bellows, than what the figures in this and the preceding chapter 
afford. 

While engaged on this part of the subject we were induced to refer 
again to the accounts of the old Mexicans and Peruvians, in hopes of find- 
ing some indications of the pump in the instruments employed to urge air 
into their furnaces ; but, strange as it will appear to modern mechanics, they 
are said to have been wholly ignorant of the bellows. This, if true, is a 
very singular fact; and, considering the extent to which they practiced the 
arts of metallurgy, one that is unexampled in the history of the world. It 
appears, moreover, irreconcilable with the opinion of their oriental origin; 
for it is difficult to conceive how emigrants or descendants of emigrants 
from Asia, could have been ignorant of this simple instrument which has 
been used in one form or another on that continent from the earliest times, 
and which is still employed by the rudest tribes there, and also in all those 
parts whence the early Peruvians are supposed to have come. The bel- 
lows is common almost as the hammer, from the peninsular of Malacca to 
that of Kampschatka, and from the Philippine islands to those of Japan, 
la Africa, too, it is used in great variety and by people whose progress in 
the arts is far behind that of the ancient smiths of America. 

How little is known respecting the mechanical implements of Mexican 
and Peruvian workmen and of their processes, and yet but three centuries 
have elapsed since the latter were in full operation ! We are not aware 
that a single tool has been preserved, much less their modes of manufac- 
ture ; nor is this much to be wondered at when the spirit that animated 
the conquerors is considered — it was the acquisition of gold, not the tools 
for or manner of working it, that they had in view ; and had it not been 
for the prodigious amount of bullion which they found worked into va- 
rious figures and utensils, we should scarcely have ever heard of the latter; 
and yet the workmanship on some of them, exceeded the value of the metal. 
That there are errors in the accounts of early writers on the arts and ap- 
paratus of old American mechanics is unquestionable, and among them 



264 On the Bellows among the Peruvians, [Book III, 

may be mentioned that which confined the materials of their cutting in- 
struments to obsidian and other stones ; whereas it is now certain that 
they had chisels, &c. of bronze or alloys of copper and tin ; and probably 
of a similar composition to those of Egyptian workmen. As for bellows, 
it was no easy task (supposing it had been undertaken by the old histo 
rians of Mexico and Peru) to determine positively that they were unknown 
throughout those extensive countries. To ascertain what tools were and 
were not used, required something more than a superficial knowledge of 
the people. Before a stranger could speak decidedly on the subject of 
bellows, it was necessary that he should become familiar with their modes 
of working the metals, by frequently visiting them in their workshops and 
dwellings; and, from an intimate knowledge of their language, making in 
quiries respecting the tools and details of the processes adopted by artisans 
of distant tribes ; for bellows might be used to a limited extent in one 
country, and (from variety in the ores, articles manufactured or customs 
of workmen) not at all in another. But there does not appear to have 
been any efforts made to collect information of this kind by the con- 
querors — its value was not appreciated by them or by their immediate 
successors, and hence the opportunity was neglected and could never be 
recalled ; for other historians agree with Clavigero, that the wonderful 
arts of the Mexican and Peruvian founders were soon lost, " by the de- 
basement of the Indians and the indolent neglect of the Spaniards." Even 
Garcilasso, although a native Indian, by his mother's side, does not seem 
to have possessed any particular knowledge on the subject of working the 
metals : he derived his information from Acosta, to whose work he refers 
his readers. 

But what are the proofs that bellows were unknown to the subjects of 
Manco Capec and Motezuma % The principal one is derived from their 
fusing metals without them : they kept their furnaces in blast, it is alledged, 
by the breath of a number of men who blew on the fires through tubes of 
bamboo. That this was often practiced there is no doubt, and that it was 
the general custom is admitted ; but it does not therefore follow that they 
had no contrivances for producing artificial blasts : this will appear from 
the practice of oriental gold and silver smiths, both of ancient and modern 
times. The fusion of gold and silver with blowing tubes is a device of remote 
antiquity, and like all ancient customs relating to the useful arts, it is still 
practiced by the Hindoos, Malays, Ceylonese, Persians and other Asiatics ; 
and also by Egyptians and numerous African tribes. The goldsmiths of 
Sumatra, Mr. Marsden observes, "in general use no bellows, but blow the 
fire with their mouths through a joint of bamboo; and if the quantity of 
metal to be melted is considerable, three or four persons sit round the fur- 
nace, which is an old broken kwali, or iron pot, and blow together : fc at 
Padang alone, where the manufacture is more considerable, they have 
adopted the Chinese bellows." 51 We have already described the single 
and also a double acting bellows of these people ; besides which they have 
that of China, and yet it seems that all the working goldsmiths of the coun- 
try, except those of a single town, still melt their metal as the Mexicans 
and the Peruvians did : hence the mere fact of the old smiths of these con- 
tinents using blowpipes to fuse metal, is no more a proof of their igno- 
rance of bellows, than the like practice is of modern Asiatics being also 
ignorant of them. 

Nothing is easier than to err respecting a knowledge of bellows in for- 
mer times, by inferences drawn from the use of blowpipes. In the oldest 

a History of Sumatra, 179. 



Chap. 2.] And Mexicans. 255 

monuments of Egypt (those of Beni Hassan) the latter are represented in 
.the remote age of Osirtasen, 1700 B. C. which to a superficial observer 
might lead to the supposition that the former were then unknown ; but a 
close examination of the sculptures shows the fallacy of such a conclusion, 
since blowing tubes are also figured long after the reign of Thothmes in 
whose time bellows were certainly common.* Again, on the last day of 
the feast of Tabernacles, the Jews were allowed by rabbinical precepts 
to light one fire from another, but not to strike new fire from stone or 
metal, nor to quench it, although to save their goods, " nor to blow it with 
bellowes, but with a reede." b Now a stranger, having an imperfect know- 
ledge of Jewish customs, upon witnessing fires thus blown would, in some 
parts of the world, be very apt to conclude that they had no bellows. And 
again, if we had not a proof that our domestic bellows was known to the 
Romans, we might have inferred from Pliny's account of statuaries and 
painters representing individuals blowing fires with their mouths, that artifi- 
cial instruments for the purpose were then unknown. 

Enough may be gathered from early writers on America to account 
for bellows not being employed in those operations in which they would 
seem to have been most required, viz : in smelting of metals. According 
to Acosta, some ores could not be reduced by bellows, but only by air 
furnaces. Grarcilasso, in the last chapter of the eighth book of his Com- 
mentaries, makes the same remark. In smelting the silver ore of Potosi, 
he says the Indians used neither bellows nor blowing tubes, but a natural 
wind, which, in their opinion, was the best ; they therefore fused the ore 
in small furnaces placed on the hills in the night time, whenever the wind 
was sufficient for the purpose ; and it was a pleasant sight, he observes, 
" to behold eight, ten, or twelve thousand of those fires at the same time, 
ranged in order upon the sides of the mountains." The Spaniards suspect- 
ing that the metal, when thus diffused among a great number of hands, 
might be more readily purloined, and that much of it was wasted in so 
many fires, introduced blast furnaces, the fires in which were urged "by 
large bellows," but these not succeeding, (the blast being too strong,) they 
had recourse to rotary bellows, (" engines with wheels, carried about with 
sails like a windmill which fanned and blowed the fire,") but these also 
failed to accomplish the purpose, " so that the Spaniards despairing of the 
success o? their inventions, made use of those which the Indians had framed 
and contrived" No stronger reason could be adduced why the bellows 
was not previously used in the reduction of ores. 

At a subsequent fusion of the metal in their dwellings, the workmen 
(says Garcilasso) instead of bellows, continued to use blowing tubes, 
" though our [Spanish] invention of bellows is much more easie and forci- 
ble to raise the fire." Supposing they were ignorant of bellows before the 
arrival of the Spaniards, here is a proof that after they became acquainted 
with these instruments, they still preferred their tubes, as the gold and 
silver smiths of Asia generally do at this day ; and hence the use of such 
tubes does not show, as has been stated, " that they were unacquainted 
with the use of bellows." 

If there was nothing else to adduce in favor of the old Peruvians being 
acquainted with bellows, or with the principle of their construction and ap- 
plication, than the balsas or blown floats which their fishermen and those 
of Chili used instead of boats, we should deem them sufficient. These 
were large bags made of skins of the sea wolf and filled with air. They 

a Wilkinson's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, iii. 339. b Purchas' 
Pilgrimage, 223. * 



256 Natural Pumps. [Book III. 

were " so well sewed, that a considerable weight could not force any of 
it out." They carried from twelve to fourteen hundred pounds, and if any 
air escaped, there were two leathern pipes through which the fishermen 
"blow into the bags when there is occasion." Frezier's Voyage to the 
South Seas, page 121. These were real bellows, only applied to another 
purpose. Had they not been found less efficient or less economical than 
blowing tubes, they would doubtless have been used as substitutes for the 
latter in the fusion and reduction of ores. It may here be noticed as a 
singular fact, and one which may possibly have reference to bellows, that 
Quetzalcoatl, the Mexican God of the air or wind, was also the Vulcan 
of all the nations of Anahuac. 

Both Mexicans and Peruvians were accustomed from their youth to use 
blowing tubes, for the primitive air gun, through which to shoot arrows 
and other missiles by the breath, "was universally used, and the practice 
is still kept up by their descendants. Motezuma, in his first interview 
with Cortez, shrewdly compared the Spanish guns, as tubes of unknown 
metal, to the sarbacans of his countrymen. From the expertness acquired 
by the constant employment of these instruments in killing game, it was 
natural enough to use them instead of bellows to increase the heat of their 
furnaces, and custom rendered them very efficient. 

We have prolonged our remarks on this subject because it has been 
concluded that remains of furnaces, found far below the surface in various 
parts of this continent and in regions abounding with iron, could never 
have been employed in reducing that metal ; for in those remote ages in 
which such furnaces were in action, the bellows, it is said, was unknown; 
a position that we think untenable, and quite irreconcilable with the 
advanced state of metallurgy in those times. 

Before leaving the subject of bellows and bellows pumps, we may re- 
mark that numerous illustrations of the latter may be found in the natural 
world. To an industrious investigator, the animal kingdom would furnish 
an endless variety, for every organized being is composed of tubes and 
of liquids urged through them. The contrivances by which the latter is 
accomplished may be considered among the prominent features in the 
mechanism of animals ; and although modified to infinitude, one general 
principle pervades the whole ; this is the distension and contraction of 
flexible vessels or reservoirs in which fluids are accumulated and driven 
through the system. On the regular function of these organs the neces- 
sary motions of life chiefly depend ; by them urine is expelled from the 
bladder, blood from the heart, breath from the lungs, &c. ; they are natural 
bellows pumps, while other devices of the Divine Mechanician resemble 
syringes or piston pumps. 

The whale spouts water with a bellows pump, and in streams compared 
with which the jet from one of our fire-engines is child's play. His blow- 
ing apparatus consists of two large membranous sacs ; elastic and capable 
of being collapsed with great force. They are connected with two bony 
canals or tubes whose orifices are closed by a valve in the form of two 
semicircles, similar to those known to pump makers as butterfly valves. 
When the animal spouts, he forcibly compresses the bags, already filled 
with water, and sends forth volumes of it to the height of 40 or 50 feet. 
The roaring noise that accompanies this ejection of the liquid is heard at a 
considerable distance, and is one of the means by which whalers, in foggy 
weather, are directed to their prey. The proboscis of the elephant is 
sometimes used as a hose pipe, through which he plays a stream in every 
direction by the pump in his chest. Numerous insects that live in water 
move their bodies by the reaction of that liquid on streams they eject from 



Chap. 2.] Natural Pumps. 257 

their bodies : oysters and some other shell fish move in this manner. My-*- 
riads of marine animals also ascend and descend in their native element by 
means of forcing pumps : when about to dive, they admit water into cer- 
tain receptacles, and in such quantities as to render their bodies speci- 
fically heavier than the fluid they float in ; and when they wish to ascend, 
they pump out the water which carried them down. 

That expert gunner, the jaculator fish, shoots his prey with pellets or 
globules of water as from a piston pump. When an insect hovers near or 
rests on some aquatic plant within five or six feet of him, he shoots from 
his tubular snout a drop of water, and with so " sure an aim as generally 
to lay it dead." The habit of ejecting saliva, which some persons ac- 
quire, is by making a pump of the mouth and a piston of the tongue. 
Other animals practice the same ; thus the llama of Chili and Peru, when 
irritated, " ejects its saliva to a considerable distance" — Frezier says ten 
paces, or thirty feet. The spurting snake of Southern Africa, it is said, 
ejects its poison into the eyes of those who attack it with unerring aim. 
The tongue of the lamprey moves backwards and forwards like a piston, 
and produces that suction which distinguishes this animal and others of the 
same family. The sting of some insects, that of the bee, for example, is 
a very complex apparatus, consisting of a lancet with its sheath, to pene- 
trate the bodies of their enemies ; first acting as a trocar and- canular, and 
then as a pump to force poison into the wound — " an awl to bore a hole, 
[says Paley,] and a syringe to inject the fluid." 

It perhaps may be supposed from the form of common pumps, that 
there is little resemblance between them and these natural machines, but 
it should be remembered that this form is purely arbitrary, (they are, as 
we have already seen, sometimes made of flexible materials, and alter- 
nately dilated and collapsed like the chests of animals.) The general 
custom of making them of hollow cylinders and of inflexible materials, 
arose from experience having proved that when thus made, they are more 
durable and less liable to derangement than any others that have yet been 
devised. 

The circulation of the blood in man and other animals is effected by 
apparatus strikingly analogous to sucking and forcing bellows pumps. The 
heart is one of these — the arteries are its forcing, the veins its suction 
pipes, and both pump and pipes are furnished with the most perfect 
valves. By contraction, this wonderful machine forces the blood through 
the former to the uttermost parts of the system ; and by distension, draws 
-t back through the latter* They vary in dimensions as in construction. 
Some are adapted to the bodies of animals so minute as to be impercep- 
tible to unaided vision, and from these to others of every size up to the 
huge leviathan of the deep. The aorta of the whale, says Paley, " is 
larger in the bore than the main pipe of the water- works at London 
bridge ; and the water roaring in its passage through that pipe, is inferior 
in impetus and velocity to the blood rushing from the whale's heart." 

Every human being may be considered as, nay is, a living pump. His 
body is wholly made up of it, of the tubes belonging to it, and the liquid 
moved by it — with such additions as are required to communicate the ne- 
cessary motion and protect it from injury. Health, life itself, every thing, 
depends upon keeping it in order. If one of its forcing pipes, (an artery,) 
be severed, we bleed to death ; are any of its sucking tubes (the veins) 

a In the 6th vol. of Machines approved by the French Academy, is the description of 
a bellovys pump, made in imitation of the heart, by M. Bedaut, who named the working 
part of it " La Cazur," the heart — of which it was a rude resemblance. 

33 



258 Advantages of Studying the Mechanism of Animals. [Book III. 

choked, the parts around them become diseased, like sterile land for want 
of nourishment ; does the pump itself stop working, we instantly die. The 
regularity and irregularity of its motions are indicated by the pulse, which 
has always been adopted as the unerring criterion of health and disease, 
or as an engineer would say, the number of its strokes per minute, is the 
proof of its state whether in good or bad working order. The pulse not 
only indicates incidental disorders in this hydraulic machine, but is a crite- 
rion of its age, as well as of its constant condition : the movements are 
strong and uniform in youth, feeble and uncertain in sickness and age, and 
as the machine wears out and the period of its labor approaches, its strokes 
at last cease and its vibrations are then silent for ever. 

What mechanic can contemplate this surprising machine without being 
electrified with astonishment that it should last so long as it does in some 
people ! Formed of materials so easily injured, and connected with tubes 
of the most delicate texture, whose ramifications are too complex to be 
traced, their numbers too great to be counted, and many of them too mi- 
nute to be perceived, and the orifices of all furnished with elaborate valves; 
that such complicated machinery should continue incessantly in motion, 
sixty, eighty, and a hundred years, not only without our aid, but in spite 
of obstructions that are daily thrown in its way, is as inexplicable and mys- 
terious as the power that impels it. 

Few classes of men are more interested in studying natural history, and 
particularly the structure, habits, and movements of animals, than mechan- 
ics ; and none can reap a richer reward for the time and labor expended 
upon it. It presents to the studious inquirer sources of mechanical com- 
binations and movements so varied, so perfect, so rovel, and such as are 
adapted to every possible contingency, as to excite emotions of surprise 
that they should have been so long neglected. There is no doubt that 
several modern discoveries in pneumatics, hydraulics, hydrostatics, optics, 
mechanics, and even of chemistry, might have been anticipated by the 
study of this department of science. Of this truth examples might be ad- 
duced from every art, and from every branch of engineering : the flexible 
water-mains (composed of iron tubes united by a species of ball and socket 
joint) by which Watt conveyed fresh water under the river Clyde were 
suggested by the mechanism of a lobster's tail — the process of tunneling 
by which Brunei has formed a passage under the Thames occurred to him 
by witnessing the operations of the Teredo, a testaceous worm covered 
with a cylindrical shell, which eats its way through the hardest wood — 
and Smeaton, in seeking the form best adapted to impart stability to the 
light-house on the Eddy stone rocks, imitated the contour of the bole of a 
tree. The fishermen's boats of Europe, adapted to endure the roughest 
weather, are the very model of those formed for her progeny by the fe 
male gnat ; " elevated and narrow at each end, and broad and depressed 
at the middle" — the beaver when building a dam — but it is vain to quote 
examples with which volumes might be filled. 



Chap. 3.] Forcing Pumps with solid Pistons. 259 



CHAPTER III. 

Forcing Pumps with solid pistons : The Syringe: Its uses, materials and antiquity— Employed by the 
Hindoos in religious festivals — Figured on an old coat of arms — Simple Garden Pump — Single valve Forc- 
ing-pump — Common Forcing-pump— Stomach pump— Forcing-pump with air-vessel — Machine of 
Ctesibius : Its description by Vitruvius— Remarks on its origin— Errors of the ancients respecting the 
authors of several inventions — Claims of Ctesibius to the pump limited — Air vessel probably invented by 
him Compressed air a prominent feature in all his inventions — Air vessels — In Heron's fountain — Ap- 
parently referred to by Pliny — Air gun of Ctesibius— The Hookah. 

The earliest machine consisting of a cylinder and piston that was ex- 
pressly designed to force liquids was probably the syringe, an instrument 
of very high antiquity : see its figure in the foreground of the next illustra- 
tion. To the closed end a short conical pipe is attached whose dimensions 
are adapted to the particular purpose for which the instrument is to be 
used. The piston is solid and covered with a piece of soft leather, hemp, 
woollen listing, or any similar substance that readily imbibes moisture, in 
order to prevent air or water from passing between it and the sides of the 
cylinder. When the end of the pipe is placed in a liquid and the piston 
drawn back, the atmosphere drives the liquid into the cylinder; whence it 
is expelled through the same orifice by pushing the piston down : in the 
former case the syringe acts as a sucking pump ; in the latter as a forcing 
one. They are chiefty employed in surgical operations, for which they 
are made of various dimensions — from the size of a quart bottle to that ot 
a quill. They are formed of silver, brass, pewter, glass, and sometimes 
of wood. For some purposes the small pipe is dispensed with, the end 
of the cylinder being closed by a perforated plate, as in those instruments 
with which gardeners syringe their plants. 

It has been said that the syringe was invented by Ctesibius, being the 
result of his first essays in devising or improving the pump ; but such 
could not have been its origin, since it is mentioned by philosophers who* 
flourished centuries before him. It was known to Theophrastus, Anaxa- 
goras, Democritus, Leucippus, Aristotle, and their pupils : to the rushing 
of water into it when the piston was drawn up, these philosophers ap- 
pealed to illustrate their opposite views respecting the cause of the liquid's 
ascent, some contending that it proved the existence of a vacuum, others 
that it did not. To this ancient application of the syringe, most of the 
early writers on atmospheric pressure allude. a " It is pretty strange [ob- 
serves Desaguliers] that the ancients, who were no strangers to the nature 
of winds, and knew a great deal of their force, were yet entirely ignorant 
of the weight and perpendicular pressure of the air. This is evident, be- 
cause they attribute the cause of water rising up in pumps, or any liquors 
being drawn up into syringes (commonly called syphons on that account, 
while pumps were call'd sucking-pumps) to nature's abhorrence of a va- 
cuum ; saying, that it fill'd up with water the pipes of pumps under the 
moving bucket or piston, rather than suffer any empty space. The syringe 
was in use, and this notion concerning its suction obtain' d long before 
Ctesibius, the son of a barber at Alexandria, invented the pump." b 

a See Rohault's Philosophy with Clarke's Notes. Lon. 1723; vol. i. 172. Switzer's 
Hydrostatics, Preface and 172. Chambers' Diet. Articles Syringe, Embolus, Vacuum. 
» Ex. Philos. vol. ii, 249. 



2G0 



The Syringe, 



[Book III. 



There is reason to believe that the syringe was employed by the Egyp- 
tians in the process of embalming. In various translations of the account, 
given by Herodotus (Euterpe, 87) it is expressly named: "They fill a 
syringe with germe of cedar wood and inject it." a Dr. Rees, in his edi- 
tion of Chambers' Dictionary, (Art. Embalming,) uses the terms " infusing 
by a syringe," and " syringing a liquid," &c. The least expensive mode 
of embalming was " infusing by a syringe a certain liquid extracted from 
the ccdar." b Beloe, in his translation, does not indicate the instrument 
used — they " inject an unguent made from the cedar." As clysters origi- 
nated in Egypt, and were used monthly by the inhabitants as a preserva- 
tive of health, (Herod, ii, 77,) we are most probably indebted to the people 
of that country for the syringe. Had it been a Grecian or Roman inven- 
tion, the name of its author would have been known, for from its utility and 
application to various useful purposes, an account of the circumstances 
connected with its origin was as worthy of preservation, as those relating 
to the pump or any other machine. Suetonius uses the term " clyster" to 
denote the instrument by which it was administered ; and Celsus by it, 
refers to "a little pipe or squirt." (Ainsworth.) Hippocrates and the elder 
Pliny frequently mention clysters, but without describing distinctly the 
instrument employed : the latter in his 30th book, cap. 7, seems to refer 
to the common pewter syringe, " an instrument or pipe of tin :" this is at 
least probable, for pewter, according to Whittaker, was borrowed from the 
Romans. It is well ascertained that pewterers were among the earliest 
workers of metal in England. A company of them was incorporated in 
1474 ; but at what time the syringe became a staple article of their ma- 
nufacture is uncertain. 




No. 115. Syringes used l>y Hindoos in celebrating some religious festivals. 

Had the syringe not been mentioned by ancient authors, its antiquity 
might be inferred from a particular employment of it by the Hindoos. The 
arts, manners and customs of these people have remained unchanged from 
very remote times ; and such is their predilection for the religious insti- 
tutions of their ancestors, that nothing has, and apparently nothing can in- 
duce them to admit of the slightest change in the ceremonies that pertain 
to the worship of their deities : hence the same rites are still performed, 



a Quoted in Ogilby's Africa. 
Newcastle : vol. i. 602. 



Lon. 1670, p. 81. b Historical Description of Egypt 



Chap. 3.] And its Applications. 261 

and by means of the same kind of instruments as when Alexander or 
even Bacchus invaded India. In some of their religious festivals the 
syringe is made to perform a prominent part ; for a red powder is mixed 
with water, with which the worshipers " drench one another by means 
of a species of squirt ; to represent Parasuu Rama, or some other hero 
returning from battle covered with blood." Some writers suppose the 
ceremony is designed to celebrate " the orgies of Krishna with his mis- 
tresses and companions." No. 115 represents a rajah and some of his 
wives engaged in this singular species of religious worship and connubial 
exercise, in honor of Krishna. The instruments are clearly garden syringes, 
and probably of the, same kind as are mentioned by Heron of Alexandria, 
as used in his time for sprinkling and dispersing water. 

The Holdee is another Hindoo festival which resembles in some mea 
sure the Saturnalia of the Romans. It is observed through all Hindostan, 
and in celebrating it, the syringe is put in requisition. Mr. Broughton, 
who, with some other Europeans, visited a Mahratta rajah to witness the 
ceremony, observes — " A few minutes after we had taken our seats, large 
brass trays filled with abeer, and the little balls already described were 
brought in and placed before the company, together with a yellow-coloured 
water, and a large silver squirt for each individual. The Muha Raj him- 
self began the amusements of the day, by sprinkling a little red and yellow 
water upon us from the goolabdans, small silver vessels kept for the pur- 
pose of sprinkling rose-water at visits of ceremony. Every one then 
began to throw about the abeer, and to squirt at his neighbour as he pleas- 
ed." (Shoberl's Hind. vol. ii, 241, and vol. vi, 14.) A somewhat similar 
custom prevails in Pegu. At the feast of waters, the king, nobles, and 
all the people sport themselves by throwing water upon one another ; and 
" it is impossible to pass the streets without being soundly wet." (Oving- 
ton's Voyage to Surat in the year 1689. Lon. 1696 : page 597.) 

The syringe in front of No. 115, is copied from Rivius' German Trans- 
lation of Vitruvius, A. D. 1548. It is from a view of the barber's shop 
belonging to the father of Ctesibius. (See pp. 121 and 122 of this volume.) 
Across the shop is a partition, behind which the young philosopher is seen 
intently perusing a book, and on the floor around him are a flute, a syringe, 
a pair of bellows, bagpipes, &c. ; while in front, the old gentleman in the 
European costume of the 16th century, and with a sword at his side ! is 
actively engaged in purifying the head and face of a customer. 

In the third volume of a Collection of "Emblems, Human and Divine" 
in Latin : Prague, 1601, page 76, a pair of bellows, a syringe, and a flying 
eolipile are represented as forming the device of some old Italian family, 
with the singular motto, " Todo est viento" 

Few ancient devices could be pointed out that have given rise to more 
important improvements in the arts than the primitive syringe. Its modi- 
fications exert an extensive and beneficial influence in society. As a pis- 
ton bellows it is still extensively used in oriental smitheries — and as the 
same, it contributed to one of the most refined pleasures of the ancients, by 
supplying wind to their organs. It may be considered as the immediate 
parent of the forcing if not of the atmospheric pump — in both of which 
it has greatly increased the comforts and conveniencies of civilized life ; 
in the fire-engine it protects both our lives and our property from the 
most destructive of the elements ; and in the hands of the surgeon and 
physician it extends the duration of life by removing disease. The mo- 
dern philosophical apparatus for exhausting air, and the ancient one for 
condensing it ; the mammoth blowing machines in our founderies, and 
the-steam engine itself, are all modifications of the syringe. 



262 



Single- Valve Forcing Pumps. 



[Book III. 



A forcing pump differs but little from a syringe : the latter receives and 
expels a liquid through the same passage, but the former has a separate 
pipe for its discharge, and both the receiving and discharging orifices are 
covered with valves. By this arrangement it is not necessary to remove 
a pump from the liquid to transfer the contents of its cylinder, as is done 
with the syringe, but the operation of forcing up water may be continuous 
while the instrument is immoveable. A forcing pump, therefore, is merely 
a syringe furnished with an induction and eduction valve — one through 
which water enters the cylinder, the other by which it escapes from it. 
Of the process or reasoning which led to the application of valves to the 
syringe, history is silent ; but as has been remarked in a previous chap- 
ter, their employment in bellows or air forcing machines, probably opened 
the way to their introduction into water forcing ones. The ordinary bel- 
lows has but one valve, and the simplest and most ancient forcing pumps 
have no more. One of these is shown at No. 116. It represents a syringe 

having the orifice at the bottom of 
the cylinder covered by a valve 
or clack, opening upwards ; and 
a discharging pipe connected to 
the cylinder a little above it : when 
placed in water the orifice of this 
pipe is closed with the finger, and 
the piston being then drawn up, 
the cylinder becomes charged, and 
when the piston is pushed down 
the valve closes and the liquid is 
Hi=: forced through the pipe. In this 
machine the finger performs the 
part of a valve by preventing ah" 
from entering the cylinder when 
the piston is being raised. Such 
pumps made of tin plate were for- 
merly common, and were used to 
wash windows, syringe plants and 
No. 116. No. 117. garden trees, &c. The figure is 

Single-Valve Forcing Pumps. from plate 57 of " L 'Exploiter des 

Mines," in Arts et Metiers, and is described (page 1584) as a Dutch 
pump, " pour envoyer commodement de 1'eau dans les differents quartiers 
de l'attelier." 

No. 117 is another single-valve forcing pump from the second volume 
of a Latin treatise on Natural Philosophy, by P. P. Steinmeyer, Friburgh, 
1767. It is secured in a cistern, the surface of the water in which is al- 
ways kept above the small openings made through the upper part ; so 
that when the piston is drawn up, as in the figure, the liquid flows in and 
fills it ; and on the descent of the piston the water is forced up the as- 
cending pipe, the valve preventing its return. This is a very simple 
and efficient forcing pump ; and having no induction valve and the piston 
being always under water, it is not very liable to derangement. It has, 
however, its defects ; for in elevating the piston the whole weight of the 
atmosphere above it has to be overcome, a disadvantage that in large ma- 
chines would not be compensated by the saving of a valve. As the piston 
has to pass the holes in the upper part of the cylinder, its packing would 
be injured if their inner edges were not rounded off. This pump has been 
erroneously attributed to a modern European engineer : see the London 
Register of Arts, v, 154, and Journal of the Franklin Institute, viii, 379. 




Chap. 3.] 



Common Forcing Pump. 



263 




No. 118. Common Forcing Pump. 



The ordinary forcing pump has two valves, as in the annexed figure, 
which represents it as generally made. The cylinder is placed above the 
surface of the water to be raised, and consequently is charged by the pres- 
sure of the atmosphere ; the machine, therefore, is a compound one, dif- 
fering from that last described, which 
is purely a forcing pump, the water en- 
tering its cylinder by gravity alone. 
The action of the machine now under 
consideration is similar to that of the 
syringe : when the piston is raised the 
air in the pipe below the cylinder rushes 
through the valve and is expelled on 
the descent of the piston through the 
other valve in the ascending or dis- 
charging pipe ; and on a repetition of 
the strokes of the piston, water rises in 
the suction pipe, enters the cylinder, 
and is expelled in the like manner. 
Pumps of this kind are sometimes placed 
in the yards of dwelling houses, the 
suction pipe extending into a well, and 
the ascending one to a cistern in the 
upper parts of the building. In these 
cases a cock is generally inserted a lit- 
tle above the valve in the ascending 
pipe to supply water if required in the 
vicinity of the pump. 
The beautiful instrument used of late years to transfer liquids into and 
from the human stomach is a modification of the above machine. It cannot 
with propriety be named a syringe, for as it is furnished with valves, it is, 
in every respect, a pump. Having been employed with much success in 
withdrawing poison from the stomach, it is now justly classed among the 
essential apparatus of the surgeon. Its origin and history are detailed in 
a pamphlet published by its inventor, Mr. John Read, of England, who 
devised it in 1819, and in the following year obtained a patent for it under 
the name of a "Stomach and Enema Pump." After visiting London 
twice in vain for the purpose of procuring suitable tubes, he tried to get 
some made in the country, but failed. On a third visit to the metropolis 
he obtained an indifferent one which he thought might answer, and after 
adapting it to a pump, " I then [he observes] presented it to Sir Astley 
Cooper, who asked me for what purpose it was intended ; I told him it 
was intended for the removal of fluid poisons from the human stomach ; 
after a few minutes inspection of the instrument, Sir A. made the follow- 
ing reply : — ' about three weeks ago I was called to attend a young lady 
about 10 o'clock in the morning who had taken opium ; I gave her sul- 
phate of copper, sulphate of zinc and other things : I sat by her until 
eight in the evening, when she died ! If I had been in possession of this 
instrument at the time, I could have relieved her in five minutes, and have 
saved her life.' After many questions how I came to think of such a 
thing, which I satisfactorily explained, he said ' what can 1 do for you ]' 
my answer was — the publicity of your opinion is all I wish : he replied, 
' that you shall soon have ;' and he ordered me to meet him the next day 
at Guy's Hospital at one o'clock, when he proposed to try an experiment 
on a dog ; but as no dog could be procured, [that day,] Sir Astley pro- 
posed Friday at the same hour ; when I attended as before, and a dog 



264 . Stomach Pumps. [Book III. 

was then ready for the experiment in the operating theatre, which was 
crowded to excess. The dog was brought to Sir A. who gave him four 
drachms of opium dissolved in water. The dog's pulse was first at 120; 
in seven minutes it fell to 110, and from that to 90. The poison was suf- 
fered to remain in the dog's stomach 33 minutes, till he appeared to be 
dead, and I was doubtful it would be the case before Sir A. would let me 
use the pump. I must confess I was very impatient to be at work on the 
dog with my instrument m hand ready for action. Sir A. kept his finger 
on the dog's pulse, then at 90, and said very deliberately, ' I think it will 
do now, as it is 33 minutes since I gave him the dose.' A basin of warm 
water being then brought, Sir A. passed the tube I had provided into the 
dog's stomach : I immediately pumped the whole contents of the basin 
[the warm water] into the stomach, and as quickly repumped the whole 
from the stomach, containing the laudanum, back again into the basin. Sir 
A. observed, while I was emptying the dog's stomach, the laudanum swim- 
ming on the surface, and said ' It will do ;' a second basin of water was 
then injected and withdrawn by the pump as before : I asked for a third, 
but Sir Astley said it was unnecessary, as the laudanum had all been re- 
turned in the first basin." In half an hour the animal was completely re- 
vived and running about the theatre. 

It may be of use to state, that the quickest and easiest mode of employ- 
ing a stomach pump (according to the inventor) is to use it only as a forc- 
ing pump — that is to inject warm water or other dilutents into the stomach 
until that organ becoming surcharged, the fluid regurgitates by the mouth ; 
in other words to fill the stomach to overflowing — the liquid passing down 
the tube and rising through the oesophagus by the side of it ; the opera- 
tion being continued till the fluid returns unchanged. In the absence of 
a pump, a tunnel or other vessel attached to a flexible tube might answer. 




No. 119. Stomach Pump. 

There are numerous varieties in stomach pumps, arising from the dif- 
ferent modes of constructing and arranging the valves, so as either to in- 
ject or withdraw liquids through the same tube without shifting the appa- 
ratus. No. 119 represents one that is described in the Journal of the 
Franklin Institute, (vol. xiii, 223.) It consists of an ordinary syringe 
screwed to a cylindrical valve box which contains two egg-shaped cavi- 
ties. In each cavity is a small and loose spherical valve that fits either of 
the orifices. Two flexible tubes are attached to each cavity as represented. 
Suppose the upper tube inserted into a person's stomach and the lower 
one into a basin of warm water ; if the syringe were then worked, the 
liquid would be forced into the stomach and the poison diluted : then by 
turning the instrument in the hand so as to bring the upper tube down, 
(without withdrawing the one in the stomach,) the valves would drop upon 
the other orifices in each cavity, and the syringe would raise the contents 
of the stomach into the basin, as represented in the figure. 



Chap. 3. 



Forcing Pump with Air Vessel. 



265 



We have no idea that the inventor of the stomach pump was indebted 
to Hudibras for the hint, yet that old warrior seems not only to have been 
a proper subject for its occasional application, but he appears to have had 
some notions that might eventually have led to it. Those readers who 
are familiar with Butler's account of him will remember that when hr. v^as 
insulted by Talgol the butcher, the knight, as he justly might, 

" grew high in wroth, 

And lifting hands and eyes up both, 
Three times he smote on stomach stout 
From whence at last these words broke out : 



Nor all that farce that makes thee proud, 

Because by bullocks ne'er withstood, 

Shall save, or help thee to evade 

The hand of justice, or this blade. 

Nor shall those words of venom base, 

Which thou hast from their native place 

Thy stomach, pumped to fling on me 

Go unrevenged : * * * * 

Thou down the same throat shall devour 'em, 

Like tainted beef, and pay dear for 'em." — Canto n, Part I. 

It was a common practice with the ancient Roman epicures to empty the 
stomach by an emetic before dinner. Had the application of the pump 
for such a purpose been then known, it would of course have been pre- 
ferred as the more agreeable and certain device of the two. But if the 
ancients had no apparatus for withdrawing the contents of the stomach, 
they were not destitute of means for conveying nauseous or corroding 
liquids into it. Pliny, in his Nat. Hist, xxx, 6. says such medicines were 
swallowed " through a pipe or tunnel" inserted into the mouth for that 
purpose. 

The pump figured at No. 118 ejects water as a syringe and only when the 
piston is forced down ; but by the addition of what is called an air-vessel, the 

stream from the discharg- 
ing pipe may be made con- 
tinuous : this vessel is clos- 
ed at its upper part, and 
open at bottom, where it is 
connected by screws to the 
forcing pipe directly over 
the valve, as represented in 
the annexed illustration. A 
discharging pipe may then 
be connected to the lower 
part of the vessel, or it may 
be, as it often is, inserted 
through the top, in which 
case its lower end should 
extend nearly to the bottom. 
When by the descent of the 
piston water is forced out 

No. 120. Forcing Pump with Air-vessel. Q f ^ cy li n( J er> part of ft 

enters the pipe, and part rushes past it and compresses the air confined in 
the upper part of the vessel ; and when the piston is raised to draw a 
fresh portion into the cylinder, this air expands and drives out the water 
that compressed it and thus renders the stream constant. It will be per- 
ceived that the quantity of water raised is not increased by this arrange- 

34 




266 Description of the Machine of Ctesibius by Vitruvius. [Book III. 

ment; its flow from the discharging orifice being merely rendered uniform, 
or nearly so. 

In the ordinary use of forcing pumps a constant instead of an inter- 
rupted flow of water from the discharging orifice, may be a matter of 
no importance ; but when those of large dimensions are required to raise 
it to great elevations, air vessels are not only valuable but indispensable 
adjuncts ; for the elastic fluid within them forms a medium for gradually 
overcoming the inertia of the ascending liquid columns, and thereby pre- 
vents those jars and shocks which are incident to all non-elastic substances 
in rapid motion, when brought suddenly to a state of rest. A column of 
water moving with great velocity through a pump, produces, when in- 
stantly stopt, a concussion like that of a solid rod of the same length, when 
its end is driven against an unyielding object; but with an air-vessel, the 
effect is like that of the same rod when brought in contact with a bale of 
cotton or caoutchouc. Less force is required also to work pumps that 
have air-vessels, because in them the column of water in the discharging 
pipe is continued in motion during the ascent of the piston, hence it has 
not to be moved from a state of rest on the piston's return. When two 
or more cylinders are connected to one discharging pipe, one air-vessel 
only is required, as in fire-engines, water- works, &c. 

It is this kind of forcing pump that is generally adopted in water- works 
for the supply of towns and cities ; the piston rods being moved by 
cranks or levers attached to water wheels : sometimes they are driven by 
windmills, steam-engines, and by animals. The cylinders are commonly 
used perpendicularly as in the figure, but they are sometimes worked in 
an inclined and also in a horizontal position. 

The celebrated pump of Ctesibius was constructed like that represented 
in the last figure, except that it had two cylinders. It seems to have been 
almost identical in its construction with our fire-engines. " It remains now 
[says Vitruvius] to describe the machine of Ctesibius which raises water 
very high. This is made of brass ; at the bottom a pair of buckets [cylin- 
ders] are placed at a little distance, having pipes like the shape of a fork 
annexed, meeting in a basin in the middle. At the upper holes of the 
pipes within the basin, are made valves, hinged with very exact joints ; 
which, stopping the holes, prevent the efflux of the water that will be 
pressed into the basin by the air. Upon the basin a cover like an inverted 
funnel is fitted, which is adjoined and fastened to the basin by a collar, 
riveted through, that the pressure of the water may not force it off : and 
on the top of it, a pipe called the tuba, is affixed perpendicularly. The 
buckets [cylinders] have valves placed below the lower mouths of the 
pipes, and fixed over holes that are in their bottoms : then pistons turned 
very smooth and anointed with oil, being inclosed in the buckets [cylin- 
ders] are worked with bars and levers from above ; the repeated motion 
of these, up and down, pressing the air that is therein contained with the 
water, the holes being shut by the valves, forces and extrudes the water 
through the mouths of the pipes into the basin; from whence rising to the 
cover, the air presses it upwards through the pipe ; and thus from the low 
situation of the reservoir, raises it to supply the public fountains." Book 
x, cap. 12. Newton's Trans. 

The machine as thus described is a proof of the progress which the an- 
cients had made in hydraulics : the whole appears to have been of the 
most durable materials, and of the best workmanship. Although the figures 
of this and other machines which Vitruvius inserted in his work are lost, 
there is little difficulty in realizing its construction from the text. Transla- 



Chap. 3.] 



Machine of Ctesibius. 



267 



tors and commentators have generally agreed in their views of it as re- 
presented below, viz : two ordinary forcing pumps connected to an air- 
vessel and one discharging pipe. 




No. 121. Machine of Ctesibius. 

The cylinders are secured in a frame of timber, and the piston rods are 
attached by joints to levers, one end of which are depressed by cams on 
the axis of the wheel, as shown above and also at No. 89. Barbaro has 
figured a crank at the axis which gives a reciprocating motion to a hori- 
zontal shaft placed over the pumps, and projecting pieces from which impart 
motion to the piston rods. Vitruvius informs us that when machines were 
employed to raise water from rivers, they were worked by undershot 
wheels impelled by the stream, and hence the pumps of Ctesibius were 
believed to have been moved by the same means. 

But for Vitruvius we should not have known that forcing pumps con- 
stituted part of the water works of antiquity ; and had he not remarked 
that they were employed to supply " public fountains," it might have been 
supposed that water never rose higher in the dwellings of ancient cities 
than that which was drawn directly from the aqueducts. 

It would be almost unpardonable to pass over this celebrated machine 
without further remark, since it is, in several respects, one of the most 
interesting of all antiquity. An account of its origin and early history 
would form a commentary on most of the arts and sciences of the ancients, 
and would, we believe, furnish evidence of their progress in some of them 
that few are willing to believe. Although it was attributed to Ctesibius, 
there is some uncertainty respecting the extent of his claims. It may ap- 
pear invidious to attempt to rob this illustrious man of inventions ascribed 
to him, but our object is to ascertain, not to depreciate them or diminish 



fWWW\ 



268 Claims of Clesibius, [Book III. 

their number. It has frequently been remarked, that little dependence 
can be placed on ancient writers as regards the authors of the useful ma- 
chines. Generally those who introduced them from abroad, who im- 
proved them, increased their effects, or extended their application, were 
reputed their inventors. This has been the case more or less in every 
part of the world, and is so at the present day. The Greeks found au- 
thors among- themselves for almost every machine, although most of them 
were certainly derived from Egypt. Thus, the sails and masts of ships, 
the wedge, auger, axe and level, were known before Daedalus. The 
saw, drill, compasses, glue and dovetailing, before Talus. Cast iron was 
employed, and moulding practiced, and the lathe invented, long before 
Theodorus of Samos lived; and the screw and the crane before Archytas. 
The last individual was celebrated for various inventions, and among 
others, Aristotle mentions the child's rattle, from which it may be infer- 
red that he was an amiable man and fond of children — but Egyptian 
children were amused with various species of toys, centuries before he 
flourished ; and they then had dolls whose limbs were moved by the 
pulling of strings or wires, as ours have at this day. Wilkinson's Man- 
ners and Customs of the Ancient Eygptians. Vol. ii, 426-7. 

As regards machines for raising water, we have already seen, that 
some have been ascribed to others than their authors. Even the siphon 
has been attributed to Ctesibius, (Adams's Lectures, vol. iii, 372,) because 
it was found in the construction of his clepsydra, and no earlier application 
of it was then known ; but it is now ascertained to have been in common use 
among his countrymen in the remote age of Rameses — in the Augustan 
era of Egypt, when the arts, we are informed, " attained a degree of per- 
fection, which no after age succeeded in imitating." Had the " Commenta- 
ries of Ctesibius" to which Vitruvius referred his readers for further infor- 
mation, been preserved, we should have had no occasion to attempt a defi- 
nition of his claims to the forcing pump ; unfortunately, however, these 
and Archimedes' Treatise on Pneumatic and Hydrostatic Engines have 
perished, and have left us in comparative ignorance of the history of such 
machines among the ancients. 

We have already seen that the syringe was in common use ages before 
Ctesibius, and that it was employed by philosophers to illustrate their hy- 
pothesis of water rushing into a vacuum. Now a forcing pump is merely 
a syringe with an additional orifice for the liquid's discharge, and having 
both its receiving and discharging orifices covered by valves or clacks. Cte- 
sibius therefore did not invent the piston and cylinder, nor was he the first 
to discover the application of these to force water, for they were in pre- 
vious use and for that purpose. Was he the inventor of valves ? No, for 
they were usedin the Egyptian bellows thirteen or fourteen hundred years 
before he lived, and appear always to have been an essential part of those 
instruments. They were employed in clepsydra ; and were most likely 
used in the hydraulic organ of Archimedes, which Tertullian has des- 
cribed. Is the arrangement of the valves, by which water is admitted 
through one and expelled by the other, to be ascribed to him'? We believe 
not, for the same arrangement was previously adopted in the bellows, so 
far as regards the application of one of them, and the principle of both : 
and if it could be shown that the Chinese bellows was then in use, as we 
suppose it was, and possibly known in Egypt, (for that some intercourse 
did take place in ancient times betwen Egypt and China, even if one peo- 
ple be not a colony of the other, is proved by Chinese bottles and inscrip- 
tions found in the tombs at Thebes,) then the merit of Ctesibius would 
seem to be confined principally to the construction of metallic bellows as 



Chap. 3.] To the invention of the Pump limited. 269 

"water forcers," or, to the application of valves to the ordinary syringe, by 
which it was converted into a forcing pump, either for air or water. ( But 
it is not certain that the last was not done before, for neither Vitruvius nor 
Plinv asserts that " water forcers" were not in previous use. The former 
says" he applied the principle of " compressed air" to them, in common 
with " hydraulic organs," " automatons," " lever and turning machines," 
and " water dials," (Book ix, cap. 9;) hence it may as well be concluded 
from this passage, that he invented these as the pump. It is, indeed, almost 
impossible to believe that the Egyptians, of whose sagacity and ingenuity, 
unrivalled monuments have come down, did not detect the application both 
of the bellow r s and syringe to raise water long before Ctesibius lived ; 
hence we are inclined to place the forcing pump in its simplest form, with 
the syringe and atmospheric pump, among the works — 

" Of names ouce famed, now dubious or forgot 
Aud buried 'midst the wreck of things that were." 

That the forcing pump was greatly improved by Ctesibius, there can 
be no question ; but that which gave celebrity to his machine was proba- 
bly the air-vessel, an addition, which though not very clearly described by 
Vitruvius, appears to have originated with him. By it the pump instead 
of acting as before like a squirt or syringe produced a continuous stream 
as in a. jet d'eau, a result well adapted to excite admiration, and to give 
eclat to his name. The whole account of his machine shows its connec- 
tion with and dependence upon air; whereas had it been simply a forcing 
pump it would have had nothing to do with it : it would have raised water 
independently of it ; and without an air-vessel Vitruvius never could have 
asserted that it forced water up the discharging tube by means of " air 
pressing it upwards." Compressed air acted a prominent part in all his 
machines. In his wind guns, water clocks, and numerous automata; some 
of the latter in the shape of birds, &c. appeared to sing, others " sounded 
trumpets," and these results are said to have been produced with " fluids 
compressed by the force of air." We may add that he compressed air in 
his hydraulic organs and precisely in the same manner as in the pump, 
viz : by water, and by either air or water forcing pumps. The commence- 
ment of his discoveries was the experiment on air with the weight and 
speculum in his father's shop, (see page 122) in which the descending 
weight " compressed the inclosed air" and forced it through the several 
apertures into the open air, and thereby produced distinct sounds. "When 
therefore Ctesibius observed that sounds were produced from the com- 
pression and concussion of air, he first made use of that principle in con- 
triving hydraulic organs, also water forcers, automatons," &c. What 
principle was this which Vitruvius says he applied to water forcers in 
common with organs, &c. ! That of compressed air, as we understand 
it ; and the employment of which is so evident, in the description of 
his machine already given. 

Does any one doubt that the air-vessel was known to, and used by 
Ctesibius 'i Let him recollect that Heron, his disciple and intimate friend, 
has also described it ; for the celebrated fountain of this philosopher, 
which still bears his name, and remains just as he left it, is simply an 
air-chamber, in which the fluid is compressed by a column of water in- 
stead of a pump ; and one of his machines for raising water by steam, was 
another, in which the elasticity of that fluid was used in a similar maimer. 
Besides these, there are others represented in the Spiritalia; indeed, a 
great portion of the figures in that work are modifications of air cham- 
bers. At pages 42 and IIS, of Commandine's Translation, are shown 



270 Air Chamber. [Book III. 

spherical vessels containing water, into which perpendicular discharging 
tubes descend : to expel the liquid, syringes or minute pumps are adapted 
to the vessels, for the purpose of injecting air or water, and by that means 
to produce jets d'eau. The common syringe is also figured at large and in 
section, p. 120. a Pliny also seems to refer to air-vessels in his xix book, cap. 
4, where he speaks of water forced up "by pumps and such like, going" 
with the strength of wind enclosed." Holland's Trans. 

As the ancients have not particularized the claims of Ctesibius to the 
pump, it is impossible to define them with precision at this distance of time. 
Perhaps the instrument had been laid aside, or the knowledge of it almost 
lost when he revived and improved it, as some of his own inventions have 
been in modern times — his gun, for example, of which Philo of Byzan- 
tium has given a description, and which " was constructed in such a man- 
ner as to carry stones with great rapidity to the greatest distance." 1 * Its 
invention has been claimed by the Germans, the French, Dutch, and from 
the following remark of Blainville, by the Swiss also: speaking of Basil, 
he observes, " They make a great noise here about a hellish invention of 
a gunsmith, who invented wind guns and pistols. This invention may be 
truly called diabolical, and the use of it ought to be forbid on pain of 
death. " c Now if the modern inventor of the air gun, an instrument which, 
two centuries ago, was spoken of as " a late invention,"* 1 cannot with cer- 
tainty be ascertained, it can hardly be expected that the specific claims of 
Ctesibius to the pump can be pointed out after a lapse of 2000 years. If he 
was the first to combine two or more cylinders to one discharging pipe — 
to form them of metal, as well as the valves and pistons — and the first to 
invent and apply air-vessels, his claims are great indeed, and for aught 
that is known to the contrary he is entitled to them all. His merits as 
respects the latter will be apparent, if we call to mind the fact that their 
application to pumps has not been known in Europe for two centuries ; 
and that their introduction was in all probability derived from him, for it 
was not till a hundred years after Vitruvius's description of his machine 
had been translated, printed and circulated, that we first hear of air-vessels 
in modern times. 

We may here remark that at whatever period tobacco was first smoked 
in the Hookah, (and according to some authors, this weed was used in 
Asia before the discovery of America,) the air-vessel was known; for that 
instrument is a perfect one, as any person may prove by the following 
experiment : let a smoker, instead of sucking at the end of the tube which 
he inserts in his mouth, blow through it, and the liquid contents of the 
hookah will be forced out through the perpendicular tube on which the 
weed is placed as in a miniature fire-engine, carrying up with it the pellet 
of tobacco, somewhat in the manner of those light-balls which are some- 
times placed on jets d'eau, or the boy's pea playing on a pipe stem. An 
operation, in the opinion of some physicians, more beneficial to the per- 
former than the ordinary one, and disposing of the scented material in a 
manner more suited to its value. 

a Heronis Alexandrini Spiritalium liber. A Federico Commandino urbinate, ex 
Graeco nuper in Latinum conversus. 1583. 
b Duten's Inquiry into the Origin of the Arts attributed to the Moderns, p. 186. 
Travels, i, 388. d Wilkins' Mat. Magic. 



Chap. 4.] 



Double acting Pump. 



271 



CHAP TER IV. 

Forcing pumps continued : La Hire's double acting pump — Plunger pump : Invented by Moreland ; 
the most valuable of modern improvements on the pump— Application of it to other purposes than rais- 
ing water— Frictionless plunger pump — Quicksilver pumps— Application of the principle of Bramah'a 
press by bees in forcing honey into their cells. Forcing pumps with hollow pistons : Employed in French 
water-works — Specimen from the works at Notre Dame— Lifting pump from Agricola — Modern lifting 
pumps — Extract from an old pump-maker's circular — Lifting pumps with two pistons — Combination 
of hollow and solid pistons — Trevethick's pump — Perkins' pump. 

Of the various modifications which the forcing pump has undergone 
in recent times we can notice but a few, and of these the greater part 
were most likely known to ancient engineers. The most prominent one 
is that by which the machine is made double acting. Now the device by 
which this is effected has not only frequently occurred to quite a number 
of ingenious men in their endeavours to improve the pump who were ig- 
norant of its having been accomplished ; but it is an exact copy of one 
that has been applied to the wind pump of China from time immemorial, 
(see No. 112 ;) it probably therefore did not escape such men as Ctesibius, 
and Heron, and others who appear to have exercised their ingenuity and 
sagacity to the utmost in order to improve this machine, and who were 
enthusiastically attached to such researches. The remarks on modern 
improvements of the atmospheric pump, pages 225-6, are equally applica- 
ble to those of the forcing one ; and it is worthy of remark, that notwith- 
standing the present improved state of mechanical science, the ancient 
forms of both now prevail — for the forcing pump as made by Ctesibius in 
Egypt, and as described by Vitruvius as used by the Romans, is still more 
common than any other. 

The double acting pump represented in the figure, was devised by M. 
La Hire in the early part of the last century. His description of it was 
published in the Memoirs of the French Academy in 1716; and from one 

of his expressions we perceive (what was in- 
deed very natural) that if he was not indebted 
for the improvement to the contemplation of 
bellows, these instruments were at least close- 
ly associated with it in his mind. The pump 
I propose [he observes] furnishes water con- 
tinually, "just as the double bellows makes 
a continual wind." The piston rod passes 
through a stuffing box or collar of leathers on 
the top of the cylinder. The latter has four 
openings covered by valves or clacks ; two 
for the admission of water and the same num- 
ber for its discharge. A B is the suction pipe, 
and C D the ascending or discharging one. 
Suppose the lower end of the suction pipe in 
water ; then if the piston be thrust down, 
the valve near B will close, and the air in the 
lowei- part of the cylinder will be forced 
through the valve at D and up the pipe D C, 
and in consequence of the rarefaction of the 
air above the piston, the valve at C will be 




No. 122. Double Acting Pump. 



272 



Plunger Pump, 



[Book III, 



closed, and water will ascend through B A and enter the cylinder at A ; 
then if the piston be raised it will force all the water above it through the 
valve at C, the only passage for it, while at the same time a fresh portion 
will enter the cylinder through the valve at B. Thus at every stroke of 
the piston, whether up or down, the contents of the cylinder are forced 
out at one end, and it is replenished at the same time through the other ; 
this pump therefore discharges double the quantity of water that an ordi- 
nary one of the same dimensions does. The piston rod may be inserted 
through either end of the cylinder, as circumstances may require. These 
pumps are frequently used in a horizontal position. 

Another variation of the forcing pump consists in making the piston of 
the same length as the cylinder but rather less in diameter, so that it may 
be moved freely in the former without touching the sides. These pistons 
are made wholly of metal and turned smooth and cylindrical, so as to 
work through a stuffing box or cupped leathers. The quantity of water 
raised at each stroke has therefore no reference to the capacity of the 
cylinder, however large that part of one of these pumps may be, for the 
liquid displaced by the piston can only be equal to that part of the latter 
that enters the cylinder. Switzer has given a figure and description of an 
old engine composed of three of these pumps " that has been some years 
erected in the county of Surrey." Newton has figured the piston bellows 
described by Vitruvius as furnishing wind to hydraulic organs in a similar 
way. In Commandine's translation of Heron's Spiritalia, page 159, the 
same kind of plunger is figured in a pump belonging to a water organ ; 
and at p. 71, a fire-engine, with two working cylinders, has pistons of the 
same kind. These pistons were formerly named plungers, and the pumps 
plunger-pumps. Their construction and action will be understood by the 
figure, which represents one of a number that were em- 
ployed in the water- works, York Buildings, London, in 
the last century. The piston was of brass, cast hollow 
and filled with lead, the outside being " turned true 
and smooth." A short rod attached to the upper end 
of the piston was connected by a chain to the arched 
end of a vibrating beam, that was moved by one of 
Newcomen's engines. The piston was therefore mere- 
ly raised by the engine, while its own weight carried 
it down : to render it sufficiently heavy for this pur- 
pose, a number of leaden disks (or cheeses, as they 
were named from their form) having holes in their 
centres, were slipped over the rod and rested upon the 
piston, as in the figure. These were increased until 
they were found sufficient to press down the piston 
and force the water up the ascending pipe. The cup- 
ped leathers through which the piston worked, were 
similar to those now used in the hydrostatic press. A 
small cistern was sometimes formed on the top of the 
pump, that the water it contained might prevent air 
from entering through the stuffing box or between the 
cupped leathers : it served also to charge the pump 
through a small pipe or cock. A valve opening up- 
wards was sometimes placed just above the plug of 
the cock, and the latter left open when the machine 
was started, that the air within the cylinder might 
escape ; and as soon as the water rose and filled the pump, the cock was 
shut. It is immaterial at what part of the cylinder the forcing or ascend- 




fcrr£3 



- 



No. 123. Plunger Pump. 



Chap. 4.] Invented by Moreland. 273 

ing pipe is attached, whether at the bottom, near the top, or at any inter- 
mediate place. Small pnmps of this kind are now commonly employed 
to feed steam boilers and for other purposes, and are worked by levers 
like the ordinary lifting and forcing pumps, the pistons being preserved 
in a perpendicular position by slings, &c. 

These pumps are believed to be of English origin, having been in- 
vented by Sir Samuel Moreland, " master of mechanics" to Charles 2d. 
Like some old philosophers, he exercised his ingenuity in improving hy- 
draulic and other engines, for raising water. Besides the plunger pump, 
for which he obtained a patent in 1675, he invented a " cyclo-elliptic 
movement" for transmitting motion to piston rods, a figure of which is in- 
serted by Belidor in the second volume of his Arch. Hydraulique. He is 
also the reputed inventor of the speaking trumpet,* of a capstan, and a 
steam-engine. ]^i 16S1 he made experiments with an engine consisting of 
two or more of his pumps at Windsor, in presence of the king and court, 
during which he forced water from the Thames in a continual stream to 
the top of the castle ; and according to Dr. Hutton, " sixty feet higher." 
Moreland visited France the same or the following year, by order of the 
king, to examine the famous water-works at Marli, and while in Paris he 
exhibited models of his pump before the French court, and also con- 
structed several for his friends. In 1683 he presented an account of va- 
rious machines for raising water to Louis 14th, in a manuscript volume 
written and ornamented with much elegance; and in 1685, an account of 
his improvements was published in Paris in a work entitled, " Elevation 
des eaux par toute sorte de machines, reduite a la mesure, au poids, a la 
balance, par le moyen d'un nouveau piston et corps de pompe ; et d'un 
nouveau mouvement cyclo-elliptique, et rejetant l'usage de toute sorte de 
manivelle ordinaires, par le Chevalier Moreland." It does not appear that 
he ever published this work in England, for Switzer had recourse to 
Ozanam, a French writer, for a description of Moreland's pump ; as he 
could procure no English account of it, "having taken great pains to find 
out what Sir Samuel had left on that head to no purpose." Ozanam states 
that Moreland spent " twelve years study and a great deal of money" to 
bring this pump to perfection ; " and without this new invention it would 
have been impossible to have reduced the raising of water to weight and 
measure, as he has done." The latter observation refers to the leaden 
weights placed on the piston rod, and the quantity of water raised by 
them : the water and the elevation to which it was raised being compared 
with the sum of the weights employed to force it up. b 

If we mistake not this is the most valuable and original modification of 
the forcing pump that modern times have produced. The friction of the 
piston is not only greatly reduced, but the boring of the cylinder is dis- 
pensed with ; an operation of considerable expense and difficulty, particu- 
larly so, before efficient apparatus for that purpose was devised. Another 
advantage is the facility of tightening the packing without taking out the 
piston or even stopping the pump. The value of Moreland's invention in 

a There is an instrument very like a speaking trumpet in the hands of a figure in one 
of the illustrations of the Eneid, executed in the fourth or fifth century, in the 25th plate 
of " Painting" in D'Agincourt's History of the Fine Arts. It is a conical tube, the 
length being equal to that of the individual using it; and by which he appears to direct, 
from the top of a tower, the combatants below. Kircherhas given a figure of a trumpet 
through which he supposed Alexander spoke to his army. 

b .See Switzer's Hydrostatics, plate 25, pp. 302, 357. La Motraye's Travels, vol. iii, 
Lon. 1732. Desaguliers' Philos. vol. ii, 266. Belidors Architecture Hydraulique, torn, 
ii, 6], and L'Art D'Exploiter Les Mines, in Arts et Metiers, page 1058, and planche 47.. 

35 



274 



Frictionless Plunger Pump. 



[Book III. 



the estimation of engineers appears from the increasing employment 
of it. It is, moreover, for aught that is known to the contrary, the parent 
of the common lifting pump ; and to its inventor the double acting steam- 
engine of Watt is in some measure due, the efficiency of that noble ma- 
chine depending entirely upon closing the top of the cylinder and passing 
the piston rod through a stuffing box — both of which bad already been 
done in this pump. Steam-engines have also been constructed on the 
same plan as these pumps ; one long piston playing in two horizontal cy- 
linders, and the power transmitted from it by means of a cross-head at- 
tached to the middle of its length, and on that part which moves between 
the stuffing boxes. Another celebrated machine is also copied from them 
— Bramah's hydrostatic press is one of Moreland's pumps. 

There is another species of plunger pumps in which the stuffing box is 
dispensed with, and consequently the piston works without friction. A 
square wooden tube, or a common pump log of 
sufficient length, and with a valve at its lower 
end is fixed in the well as shown in the figure. 
The depth of the water must be equal to the 
distance from its surface to the place of delive- 
ry ; and a discharging pipe having a valve 
opening upwards is united to the pump tree at 
the surface of the water in the well. The pis- 
ton (a solid piece of wood) is suspended by a 
chain from a working beam, and loaded suffi- 
ciently with weights to make it sink. As the 
liquid enters the pump through the lower valve, 
and stands at the same level within as without, 
whenever the piston descends, it necessarily dis- 
places the water, which has no other passage 
to escape but through the discharging pipe, in 
consequence of the lower valve closing. And 
when the piston is again raised as in the figure, 
a fresh portion of water enters the pump and is 
driven up in like manner. 

Dr. Robison observes that he has seen a ma- 
chine consisting of two of these pumps, made 
by an untaught laboring man. The plung- 
ers were suspended from the ends of a long 
beam, on the upper surface of which the man 
walked, as on the picotah of India. He stood 
on one end till one plunger descended to the 
bottom of its tube, and he then walked to the 
other end, the declivity at first being about 25°, but gradually growing less 
as he advanced. In this way he caused the other plunger to descend, 
and so on alternately. 

By this machine a feeble old man whose weight was llOlbs. raised 7 
cubic feet of water 11 J feet high in a minute, and wrought eight or ten 
hours every day. A stout young man weighing 1341bs. raised 8J cubic 
feet to the same height in the same time. The application of this pump 
is extremely limited, and there is a waste of power in the water that is 
uselessly raised around the piston at every stroke. 

The pistons of preceding machines are made of solid materials; but 
the pump now to be described has a liquid one. It was invented about 
the year 1720, by Mr. Joshua Haskins, who made the first experiment with 
it in the house and presence of die celebrated Desaguliers. His design 




No. 124. Frictionless Plunger 
Pump. 



Chap. 4.] 



Mercurial Pump. 



275 



was to avoid the friction and consequent loss of power in common pumps, 
he' therefore " contrived a new way of raising water without any friction 
of solids ; making use of quicksilver instead of leather, to keep the air or 
water from slipping by the sides of the pistons." Various modifications 
of it were soon devised by the inventor, by Dr. Desaguliers, and by Mr. 
William Vreem, the assistant of the latter, " who was an excellent mecha- 
nic." One form of it is represented by the figure. A is the suction pipe, 
the lower end of which is inserted in the water to be raised. Its upper 
end terminates in the chamber C, and is covered by a valve. The forcing 
pipe B, with a valve at its lower end, is also connected to the chamber. 
Between these valves a pipe, open at both ends, 
is inserted and bent down, as in the figure. The 
straight part attached to it is the working cylinder 
of the pump and should be made of iron. Another 
iron pipe, a little larger in the bore than the last, 
and of the same length, is made to slide easily 
over it. This pipe is closed at the bottom and 
suspended by chains or cords, by which it is 
moved up and down. Suppose this pipe in the 
position represented, and filled with mercury — if 
it were then lowered, the air in the cylinder and 
between the valves would become rarified, and 
the atmosphere pressing on the surface of the 
water in which the end of A is placed, would force 
the liquid up A till the density of the contained 
air was the same as before ; then by raising the 
pipe containing the mercury, the air, unable to es- 
cape through the lower valve, would be forced 
through the upper one ; and by repeating the ope- 
ration, water would at last rise and be expelled 
in the same way ; provided the elevation to which 
it is to be raised does not exceed thirteen times 
the depth of the mercurial column around the cy- 
linder ; the specific gravity of quicksilver being 
so many times greater than that of water. When 
the depth of the former is 30 inches, the latter 
may be raised as many feet in the suction pipe and forced up an equal 
distance through the forcing one, making together an elevation of sixty 
feet ; but if water be required higher, the depth of the mercurial column 
in the moveable pipe must be proportinably increased. To make a small 
quantity of mercury answer the purpose, a solid piece of wood or iron 
that is a little less than the cylinder, is secured to the bottom of the move- 
able vessel as shown in the centre : this answers the same object as an 
equal bulk of mercury. 

These pumps have their disadvantages : they are expensive ; and how- 
ever well made, the quantity of quicksilver required is considerable — the 
agitation consequent on the necessary movement soon converts it into an 
oxide and renders it useless — great care is also required in working these 
machines; if the movements are not slow and regular, the mercury is very 
apt to be thrown out ; to prevent which the upper end of the vessel con • 
taining it is dished or enlarged. For experimental researches modifica- 
tions of such pumps may be useful, but for the reasons above stated, they 
have never been extensively employed in the arts. A simple form of one 
is described in a late volume of the London Mechanics' Magazine, and 
also in the 22d vol. of the Journal of the Franklin Institute, p. 327. See 




No. 125. Mercurial Pump. 



276 Hydrostatic Press. [Book III. 

also vol. xxxii, Phil. Transactions, and Abridg. vol. vi, 352. Desaguliers' 
Phil. vol. ii, 491. In Jamieson's Dictionary, p. 852, a mercurial pump in 
the form of a wheel is described. 

The hydrostatic press is simply a cylindrical forcing pump, whose piston 
is moved by the water, instead of the latter by it. A platen, on which are 
placed the articles to be pressed, is connected to the upper end of the piston 
rod ; water is then injected into the cylinder by a much smaller pump, 
and as this liquid is, to all practical purposes, incompressible, the piston is 
necessarily raised, and the articles brought against an immoveable plate, 
between which and the platen they are compressed. The degree of pres- 
sure thus excited depends upon the difference between the area of the 
pistons of the pump and of the press. The apparatus exhibits in another 
form, the celebrated hydrostatic paradox by which the pressure of a liquid 
column however small, is made to counterbalance that of another however 
large. Hydrostatic presses have been applied with advantage in nume- 
rous operations, as, expressing oil from seeds, pressing paper, books, hay 
and cotton ; tearing up trees by the roots, proving the strength of steam 
boilers, metallic water-pipes, and even cannon. In this city (New- York) 
ships of a thousand tons are raised out of the water to repair, by one of 
these machines erected at the head of one of the docks. The cylinder 
is secured in a horizontal position, and the pumps are worked by a steam- 
engine. The frame on which the vessel floats, and by which it is raised, 
is suspended by a number of chains on each side that pass over pulleys and 
terminate at the end of the piston. 
JL There is a very interesting and beautiful illustration of the principle 
of Bramah's hydrostatic press in the contrivance by which bees store 
their honey. The cells, open at one end and closed at the other, are ar- 
ranged horizontally over each other, and in that position are Jilled with 
the liquid treasure. Now suppose a series of glass tumblers or tubes laid 
on their sides and piled upon one another in like manner were required 
to be then filled with water, it certainly would require some reflection to 
devise a plan by which the operation could be performed ; but whatever 
mode were hit upon, it could not be more ingenious and effective than that 
adopted by these diminutive engineers. At the further or closed extre- 
mity of each cell, they fabricate a moveable piston of wax which is fitted 
air tight to the sides, and when a bee arrives laden with honey, (which is 
contained in a liquid form, in a sack or stomach,) she penetrates the piston 
with her proboscis and through it injects the honey between the closed 
end of the cell and the piston, and then stops the aperture with her feet. 
The piston is therefore pushed forward as the honey accumulates behind 
it, till at last it reaches the open end of the cell, where it remains, herme- 
tically sealing the vessel and excluding the air. a As soon as one cell 
is thus charged, the industrious owners commence with another. It 
will be perceived that these pistons are propelled precisely as in the hy- 
drostatic press, the liquid honey being incompressible, (with any force to 
which it is there subjected,) every additional particle forced in necessa- 
rily moves the piston forward to afford the required room. Without such 
a contrivance the cells could no more be filled, and kept so, than a bucket 
could be, with water, while laying on one side. Were the organization 

a To keep the honey pure, and preserve it from evaporation, in the high temperature 
of a hive, the air must he kept from it. Could human ingenuity have devised a more 

f)erfect mode of accomplishing the object? The fact is, bees in this matter, might Jong ago 
lave taught man the practice which is now pursued of preserving both liquid and solid 
aliment/resA for vears — in tin cases impervious to the air, and from which it has been 
excluded. 



Chap. 4.] 



French Lifting Pumps. 



277 




No. 126. Lifting Pump. 



of .bees closely examined, it would doubtless be found that the relative 
diameters of their proboscis and of the cells, and the area of the (bellows) 
pumps in their bodies, are such as are best adapted 
to the muscular energy which they employ in work- 
ing the latter. Were it otherwise, a greater force 
might be required to inject the honey and drive for- 
ward the piston, than they possess. In the case of 
a hydrostatic press, when the resistance is too great 
to be overcome by an injection pump of large dia- 
meter, one of smaller bore is employed. 

We shall now produce a few specimens of forc- 
ing pumps with hollow pistons, or such as admit wa- 
ter to pass through them. If a common atmospheric 
pump be inverted, its cylinder immersed in water, 
and the valves of the upper and lower boxes reversed 
as in the figure, it becomes a forcing, or, as it is 
sometimes named, a lifting pump ; because the con- 
tents of the cylinder are lifted up when the piston is 
raised, instead of being driven out from below by its 
descent, as in Nos. 116, 117, In a lifting pump the 
liquid is expelled from the top of the cylinder — in 
a forcing one from the bottom — it is the water 
above the piston that is raised by the former ; and that which enters be- 
low it, by the latter. The piston rod in the figure is attached to an iron 
frame that is suspended to the end of a beam or lever as in Nos. 123, 124. 
The valve on the top of the piston, like that at the end of the cylinder, 

A|I| opens upwards. When the piston descends (which 
g it does by its own weight and that of the frame) its 
H valve opens and the water enters the upper part of 
J|f the cylinder, then as soon as it begins to rise its 
valve closes, and the liquid above it is forced up the 
ascending pipe. Upon the return of the piston the 
upper valve is shut by the weight of the column 
above it, the cylinder is again charged and its con- 
tents forced up by a repetition of the movements. 
Machines of this description are of old date. They 
were formerly employed in raising water from 
mines. They were adopted by Rannequin in the 
celebrated water-works at Marli ; and by Lintlaer 
in the engines he erected during the reign of Henry 
4th, at Pont Neuf, to supply the Louvre from the 
river Seine. 

As they cannot in all locations be inserted con- 
veniently in the reservoir containing the water to 
be raised, they have sometimes been placed in cis- 
terns erected above the original source, and sup- 
plied by atmospheric pumps extending to it, as in 
No. 127. The cylinder of the atmospheric pump 
terminates in the bottom of the cistern, and is plac- 
ed directly under that of the lifting one ; the pistons 
of both being attached to the same rod and worked 
by the same frame. Such was the construction oi 
No. 127. Pumps from water- the old Parisian water- works at the bridge of No- 
works at Notre Dame, Paris. tre Dame. These consisted of a series of pumps 
arranged as in the figure, and worked by an undershot wheel. 




278 



Lifting Pumps. 



[Book III. 



If the head of a common pump (No. 90) be closed, except an opening 
through which the rod works, or may be worked, it is then converted 
into a lifting pump, and will raise water to any elevation through a pipe 
attached to the spout. The earliest specimen that we have met with is 
represented by the 128th figure, from Agricola. Although a rude device, 
it is interesting as illustrative of the resources of old mining engineers, in 
modifying and applying the common wooden pump under a variety of 
circumstances. The upper parts of two atmospheric pumps terminate 
in a close chamber or strong box, (two sides of which are removed in the 
figure to show its interior,) their lower ends extending into water collected 
at a lower depth in the mine. From the top of the box a forcing pipe is 
continued to the surface of the ground, or to another level in the mine, 
from which the water raised through it can be discharged. The piston 
rods are worked by a double crank, one end of which turns in a socket 
formed in the inside of the chamber, and the other is continued through 
the opposite side and bent into a handle by which the laborer works the 
machine. Two collars are formed on the crank axle, one close to the out- 
side, and the other to the inside of that part of the chamber through which 
it passes, and some kind of packing seems to have been used to prevent 
the water from leaking through. Four iron arms with heavy balls at their 
ends are secured to the axle to equalize the movement. These were the 
old substitutes for the modern fly-wheel : they were quite common in 
all kinds of revolving machinery in the 15th and 16th centuries. 





No. 128. Lifting Pump from Agricola. No. 129. Modern Lifting Pump. 

The modern form of the lifting pump is represented in figure No. 129. 
The working cylinder being generally brass or copper, and having a 
strong flanch at each end : the upper one is covered by a plate with a 
stuffing box in the centre, through which the polished piston rod moves ; 
and the under one by another to which the suction pipe is attached, and 
whose orifice is covered by a valve. To the forcing or discharging pipe 



Chap. 4.] Lifting Pump with two Pistons. 279 

a cock is commonly soldered as in No. 118, to supply water when re- 
quired at the pump. This is one of the most useful forms of the pump 
for household purposes : it may be placed in the kitchen, cellar or yard, 
and will not only draw water from a well, but will force it up to eVery 
floor of a dwelling, and still answer every object of the ordinary atmos- 
pheric pump ; and if an air-vessel be connected to the pipe, as in No. 120, 
it will then become a domestic fire-engine ; and when a sufficient length 
of hose pipe is kept at hand, water may, in case of fire, be conveyed in a 
few moments to any part of the building. Desaguliers, a century ago, re- 
commended this application of it, and it is surprising that it has not be- 
come more general. The following extract from a pump-maker's circular, 
120 years since, refers to it. " Pumps which may be worked by one man, 
for raising water out of any well, upwards of 120 feet deep, sufficient for 
the service of any private house or family, and so contrived that by turn- 
ing a cock, may supply a cistern at the top of the house, or a bathing vessel 
in any room ; and by screwing a leather pipe the water may be conveyed 
either up stairs, or in at a window, in case of any fire." Switzer's Hy- 
drostatics, 352. 

Although the valve in the ascending pipe is not an essential part of 
these pumps, it is a valuable addition, since it removes the pressure of the 
liquid column above it from the stuffing box, when the pump is not in use. 
The inventor of these pumps (and of the stuffing box) is unknown. They 
are described by Desaguliers, Belidor, and other writers of the last cen- 
tury as then common, and they are figured in the 6th volume of machines 
and inventions approved by the French Academy, p. 19. 

Sometimes the cylinder itself has been made to answer the purpose of 
an air-vessel. With this view it is made longer than usual, and the dis- 
charging pipe is connected to the middle of its length, below which the 
piston works. The air is therefore compressed in the upper part of the 
cylinder, but as it is liable to escape at the joints and through the stuff- 
ing box, a separate vessel is far preferable. Mr. Martin, in the 2d vol. of 
his Philosophy, has figured and described a pump of this kind, which he 
says was the invention of Sir James Creed. 

In 1815, the London Society of Arts awarded a silver medal and fifteen 
guineas for a lifting pump with two pistons. The cylinder was made 
twice the usual length, and each end furnished with a stuffing box through 
which two separate rods worked. The suction pipe being attached, like 
the forcing one, to the side of the cylinder; the lower piston was inverted 
having its valve on the top as in No. 126. The outer ends of the rods 
were connected to the centre of two small wheels or friction rollers which 
moved between two guide pieces, and thus prevented the rods from de- 
viating from the centre of the cylinders ; the upper wheel was connected 
by a short rod to the pump lever as in the common pumps, and the other 
one by a longer rod (bent at its lower part) to the same lever, but on the op- 
posite side of the fulcrum; so that as one was raised the other was lowered; 
hence the two pistons alternately approached to and receded from each 
other, and consequently one of them was always forcing up water when- 
ever the machine was at work. Transactions Soc. Arts, vol. xxxiii. 115. 
We believe these pumps have never been much used, nor do we think they 
possess any advantages over two separate ones; for they are to all intents 
and purposes double pumps. The cylinders are twice the length of single 
ones — they have two pistons, two rods, two stuffing boxes, and double the 
amount of friction of single ones. Two distinct pumps are more econo- 
mical. After one of the above has been a little while in use, air will un- 
avoidably insinuate itself through the lower stuffing box and diminish or 



280 



Description of a Pump from Besson. 



[Book III. 



destroy the vacuum upon which the efficiency of the machine depends. 
The same remarks apply to these that were made on atmospheric pumps 
with two pistons, at page 227. 

There is a pump with two pistons in Besson's Theatre des Instrumens, 
which shows that such devices were known in the 16th century. It con- 
sists of a square trunk four or five feet in length, and the bore five or six 
inches across, immersed perpendicularly in water at the bottom of a 
well ; its lower end being open and the upper one closed, except at the 
centre, where an opening is left and covered by a valve. A square piston, 
with its valve opening upwards, is fitted to work in the trunk from below 
by a rod connected to its under side, as in No. 126. A lever passes 
through the lower part of the trunk, (through slits made for it in tw r o op- 
posite sides,) one end of which is secured to a piece of timber walled in the 
well, by a pin, on which it moves ; and the other end extends to the op- 
posite side of the trunk, where it is hooked to a chain that reaches from 
the pump brake at the top of the well. The lower end of the piston rod 
is connected by a bolt to that part of the lever that is within the trunk. 
This apparatus forms the lifting or forcing part of the machine. A com- 
mon pump tree or bored log extends from the place to which the water 
is to be raised, to the top of the trunk, and the junction with the latter 
made perfectly tight : an upper box or piston with its rod is fitted to work 
in the tree like an ordinary wooden pump, while the valve on the trunk 
answers the purpose of a lower box. This rod is attached to the brake on 
one side of the fulcrum and the chain that is connected to the lever and 
lower rod to the opposite side, so that as one piston rises the other de- 
scends and a constant stream of water is discharged above. 

This is the oldest pump with' two pistons that we know of, and it has 
one advantage over others, viz : in raising water without changing its di- 
rection. We at first intended to insert a figure of it, but the apparatus 
for working it is too complicated for popular illustration. Although mo- 
tion is imparted to the piston as noticed above, it is not done directly, but 
by means of such an enormous amount of complex and 
useless machinery as would excite amazement in a mo- 
dern mechanician. There is an assemblage of rods and 
levers, tongs and lazy tongs, chains, right and left hand- 
ed screws, a heavy counterpoise and a massive pendu- 
lum, &c, all of which are required to be put in motion be- 
fore the pistons can be moved. A figure of such a pump 
would possibly interest some readers as a matter of 
curiosity, for certainly a rarer example of the waste 
of power could not well be imagined : it presents as 
clumsy and " round-about" a mode of accomplishing a 
very simple purpose, as that of the genius who, in tap- 
ping a cask of wine, never thought of inserting the 
spigot into the barrel, but attempted to drive the barrel 
on the spigot. 

Sometimes pumps with solid and hollow pistons are 
combined as in No. 130, a contrivance of Mr. Treve- 
thick. The cylinder of a forcing pump communicates 
with that of an atmospheric one ; both piston rods are 
connected to a cross-bar and rise and fall together. When 
the pistons are raised the water above that in the long 
(or atmospheric) cylinder is discharged at the spout, and 
the space below them is filled by the atmosphere fore- 




No. 130. Trcvethick's 
Pump. 



fresh portions through the suction 



pipe. 



Whe 



Chap. 5.] Rotary Tumps. 281 

the pistons descend, the valve on the suction pipe closes, and the solid 
piston drives the water in its cylinder through the hollow one in the other, 
so that whether rising or falling the liquid continues to flow. As both 
cylinders are filled at the same time, the bore of the suction pipe should 
be proportionably enlarged. The plate bolted over the opening at the 
lower part of one cylinder is to give access, in large pumps, to the 
lower valve. 

In some pumps both a solid and a hollow piston are made to work in 
the same cylinder. Such were those that constituted the " single-cham- 
ber fire-engine" of Mr. Perkins. A plunger worked through a stuffing 
box as in No. 123, and its capacity was about half that of the cylinder ; 
consequently on descending it displaced only that proportion of the contents 
of the latter. The apertures of discharge were at the upper part of the 
cylinder, and a single receiving one at the bottom. From the lower end 
of the plunger a short rod projected, to which a hollow piston or sucker 
was attached, fitted to work close to the cylinder, so that when the plunger 
was raised, this piston forced all the water above it through the discharg- 
ing apertures. To convert one of these pumps into a fire-engine, the cy- 
linder of the pump was surrounded by a shorter one of sheet copper, the 
lower end of which was left open, and its upper one secured air-tight to 
the flanch of the pump ; the space left between the two forming a passage 
for the water expelled out of the inner one. A larger and close cylinder 
encompassed the last, and the space between them was the air chamber, to 
the lower part of which a hose pipe was attached by a coupling screw 
in the usual way. 

Such pumps are more compact than those with two cylinders, but they 
are more complex, less efficient, and more difficult to keep in order and to 
repair. The friction of the plunger and sucker is much greater than that 
of the piston of an ordinary double acting pump of the same dimensions ; 
and the latter discharges double the quantity of water; for although double 
acting, the effect of these pumps is only equal to single acting ones. For 
the above reasons they have, we believe, become obsolete or nearly so. 



CHAPTER V. 

Rotary or rotatory pumps : Uniformity in efforts made to improve machines — Prevailing custom * 
convert rectilinear and reciprocating movements into circular ones— Epigram of Antipater— Ancie l 
opinion respecting circular motions— Advantages of rotary motions exemplified in various machines 
Operations of spinning and weaving ; historical anecdotes respecting them— Rotary pump from S&> 
vicre— Interesting inventions of his— Classification of rotary pumps— Eve's steam-engine and pump- 
Auother class of rotary pumps— Rotary pump of the 16th century— Pump with sliding butment— Trot 
ter's engine and pump— French rotary pump— Bramah and Dickenson's pump— Rotary pumps with pis 
tons in the form of vanes— Centrifugal pump— Defects of rotary pumps— Reciprocating rotary pumps 
A French one — An English one — Defects of these pumps. 

No one can study the past and present history of numerous machines 
and devices without perceiving a striking uniformity in the efforts made 
to improve them in distant times and countries ; the same general defects 
and sources of defects seem always to have been detected, and similar me- 
thods hit upon to remedy or remove them : the same ideas, moreover, led 
inventors to modify and apply machines to other purposes than those foi 
which they were originally designed, and also to increase their effect by 
changing the nature and direction of their motions. So uniform have been 

36 



282 Conversion of Rectilinear and Alternating Motions. [Book III. 

the speculations of ingenious men in these respects, that one might be al- 
most led to suppose they had reasoned, like the lower animals from a com- 
mon instinct ; and that the adage of Solomon, " there is no new thing un- 
der the sun," was as applicable to the inventions of man, as the works of 
nature. It would indeed be no very hard task to show that the preacher 
was correct, to an extent not generally believed, when he penned the fol- 
lowing 'interrogatory and reply — " Is there any thing whereof it may be 
said, — See, this is new 1 — it hath been of old time which was before us." 
Did a modern savan invent some peculiar surgical instruments of great 
merit 1 — similar ones were subsequently discovered in the ruins of Pom- 
peii. Have patents been issued in late years for economizing fuel in the 
heating of water, by making the liquid circulate through hollow grate 
bars 1 — the same device has been found applied to ancient Roman boilers. 
And the recent practice of urging fires with currents of steam (also patented) 
was quite common in the middle ages. (See remarks on the Eolipile in 
the next book.) Numbers of such examples might be adduced from al- 
most every department of the useful arts. 

From the earliest times it has been an object to convert, whenever prac- 
ticable, the rectilinear and reciprocating movements of machines into cir- 
cular and continuous ones. Old machinists seem to have been led to this 
result by that tact or natural sagacity that is more or less common to all 
times and people : thus the dragging of heavy loads on the ground led to 
the adoption of wheels and rollers — hence our carts and carriages : — the 
rotary movements of the drill and the wimble superseded the alternating 
one of the punch and gouge, in making perforations : — the horizontal wheel 
of the potter rendered modeling of clay vessels by hand no longer neces- 
sary : — the whetstone gave way to the revolving grindstone : — the turning 
lathe produced round forms infinitely more accurate, and expeditiously than 
the uncertain and irregular carving or cutting away with the knife. The 
quern, or original hand mill, was more efficacious than the alternate action 
of the primitive pestle and mortar for bruising grain ; and the various 
forces by which corn mills have subsequently been worked, have always 
been applied through revolving mechanism. The short handles, on the 
moveable stone, by which females and slaves moved it round, became in 
time lengthened into levers, and being attached to the peripheries of 
larger stones, slaves were sometimes yoked to them, who ground the grain 
by walking round a circular path. Subsequently slaves were replaced by 
animals, and these, in certain locations, by inanimate agents — wind and 
water. The period is unknown when man first derived rotary motion 
from the straight currents of fluids, for there is no sufficient reason to be- 
lieve that the water mill located near the residence of Mithridates was the 
first one ever used in grinding corn : that may have been the one first 
known to the Romans ; but it is very probable that such machines as well 
as wind mills were in use in Egypt, Syria, China, and other parts of Asia, 
in times that extend far beyond the confines of authentic history. An epi- 
gram of Antipater, a contemporary of Cicero, implies that water mills 
were not then very common in Europe. " Cease your work, ye maids, 
ye who laboured in the mill : sleep now, and let the birds sing to the ruddy 
morning, for Ceres has commanded the water nymphs to perform your 
task ; these, obedient to her call, throw themselves on the wheel, force 
round the axle-tree, and by these means the heavy mill." 

Rotary motions were favorite ones with ancient philosophers : they 
considered a circle as the most perfect of all figures, and erroneously con- 
cluded that a body in motion would naturally revolve in one. 

To the substitution of circular for straight motions, and of continuous for 



Chap. 5.] Into Continuous Circular Ones. 283 

alternating ones may be attributed nearly all the conveniences and elegan- 
cies of civilized life. It is not too much to assert that the present advanced 
state of science and the arts is due to revolving mechanism; we may 
speak of the wonders that steam and other motive agents have wrought, 
but what could they have done without this means of employing them 1 
The application of rotary, in place of other movements, is conspicuous in 
modern machinery; from that which propels the stately steam ship through 
the water, and those flying chariots named " locomotives" over the land, 
to that which is employed in the manufacture of pins and pointing of nee- 
dles. It is by this that the irregular motion of the ancient flail and primeval 
sieve, have become uniform in thrashing, bolting and winnowing machines ; 
— hence our circular saws, shears and slitting mills ; — the abolition of 
the old mode of spreading out metal into sheets with the hammer, by 
the more expeditious one of passing it through rollers or flatting mills : — 
and hence revolving oars or paddle wheels for the propulsion of vessels — 
the process of inking type with rollers in place of hand balls — rotary and 
power printing presses — and revolving machines for planing iron and 
other metals instead of the ancient practice of chipping off superfluous por- 
tions with chisels, and the tedious operation of smoothing the surfaces 
with files. 

But in few things is the effect of this change of motion more conspi- 
cuous than in the modern apparatus for preparing, spinning and weaving 
vegetable and other fibres, into fabrics for clothing. The simple application 
of rotary motions to these operations has in a great degree revolutionized 
the domestic economy of the world, and has increased the general com- 
forts of our race a hundred fold. From the beginning of time females 
have spun thread with the distaff and spindle : Naamah the antediluvian, 
and Lachesis and Omphale the mythological spinsters, have been imi- 
tated in the use of these implements by the industrious of their sex in all 
ages and countries to quite modern days, and even at present they are 
employed by a great part of the human family. In India, China, Japan, 
and generally through all the East, as well as by the Indians of this he- 
misphere, this mode of making thread is continued : the filaments are 
drawn from the distaff and twisted by the finger and thumb, the thread 
being kept at a proper tension by a metallic or other spindle, sus- 
pended to it like the plummet of a builder's level, and the momentum of 
which, while turning round, keeps twisting the yarn or thread in the 
interim of repeating the operation with the fingers. 3 The thread as it is 

a There are numerous allusions in history to this primitive mode of spinning, that are 
highly illustrative of ancient manners. At the battle of Salamis, Queen Artemisia com- 
manded a ship in the Persian fleet, and Xerxes, as a compliment to her bravery, sent 
her a complete suit of armor, while to his general (who was defeated) he presented a 
distaff and spindle. When Pheretine applied to Euelthon of Cyprus for an army to re- 
cover her former dignity and country, he intimated the impropriety of her conduct by 
sending her a distaff of wool and a golden spindle. Herod, iv, 162. Hercules attempted 
to spin in the presence of Omphale, and she bantered him on his uncouth manner of 
holding the distaff. Among the Greeks and Romans, the rites of marriage directed the 
attention of women to spinning ; a distaff and fleece were the emblems and objects of 
the housewife's labors; and so they were among the Jews — " A virtuous woman [says 
Solomon] layeth her hands to the spindle and her hands hold the distaff." When Lu- 
cretia was surprised by the visit of Collatinus and his companions of the camp, although 
the night was far advanced, they found her with her maids engaged in spinning. A 
painting found in Pompeii represents Ulysses seated at his own gate, and concealed 
under the garb of a beggar ; Penelope, who is inquiring of the supposed mendicant for 
tidings of her husband, holds in one hand a spindle, as if just called from spinning. On 
the monuments of Beni Hassan both men and women are represented spinning and 
weaving. Several Egyptian spindles are preserved in the museums of Europe. Sea 
an account of a female in Sardis spinning while going for water, at page 22. 



284 Rotary Tumps and Steam-engines. [Book III. 

formed is wound round the spindle. In 1530 Jurgen of Brunswick de- 
vised a machine which dispensed with this intermitting action of the fingers, 
i. e. he invented the spinning wheel, which rendered the operation of 
twisting the filaments uniform. The wheel, however, like the primitive 
apparatus it was designed to supersede, produced only one thread at a 
time; but in the last century Hargreaves produced the " spinning jenny," 
by which a single person on turning a wheel, could spin eighty -four threads 
at once ; then followed the " rollers" of Arkwright, the " mule" of Crompton, 
to which may be added the " gin" of Whitney, and also "carding engines," 
in place of the old hand cards, all composed of and put in motion by 
revolving machinery : — these have indefinitely extended the spinning of 
thread, and relieved females from a species of labor that, more than any 
other, occupied their attention from the beginning of the world ; and lastly 
" power looms" impelled by water, wind, steam, or animals (through the 
agency of circular movements) are rapidly superseding the irregular and 
alternating motion of human hands in throwing the shuttle to and fro. 

The conversion of intermitting into continuous circular movements is 
also obvious in ancient devices for raising water. The alternate action of 
the swape, the jantu and vibrating gutter thus became uninterrupted 
in the noria and tympanum — the irregular movement of the cord and 
bucket became uniform in the chain and pots ; and so did the motion of 
the pitcher or pail as used by hand, when suspended to the rim of a Per- 
sian wheel. And when the construction of machines did not allow of a 
suitable change or form, they were often worked by cranks or other simi- 
lar movements ; (of this several examples are given in preceding pages;) 
but in no branch of the arts has this preference for circular movements 
over straight ones been so signally exhibited as in the numerous rotary 
pumps and steam engines that have been and still are brought forward ; 
and in no department of machinery has less success attended the change. 
Most of these machines that have hitherto been made may be considered 
as failures ; this result is consequent on the practical difficulties attending 
their construction, and the rendering of them durable. These difficulties 
(which will appear in the sequel) are to a certain extent unavoidable, so 
that the prospect of superseding cylindrical pumps and steam-engines is 
probably as remote as ever. 

At an early stage in the progress of the machines last named, it became 
a desideratum with engineers to obtain a continuous rotary movement of 
the piston rod in place of the ordinary rectilinear and reciprocating one, 
that the huge " walking beam," crank and connecting shaft might be dis- 
pensed with, the massive fly-wheel either greatly reduced or abandoned, 
and the power saved that was consumed in overcoming their inertia and 
friction at every stroke of the piston. Reasoning analogous to this had 
long before led some old mechanicians to convert the motion of the com- 
mon pump rod into a circular one ; in other words, to invent rotary or 
rotatory pumps. By these the power expended in constantly bringing 
all the water in the cylinder and suction pipe, alternately to a state of rest 
and motion was saved, because the liquid is kept in constant motion in 
passing through them. The steam engine was not only originally de- 
designed as a substitute for pumps to raise water, but in all the variety of 
its forms and modifications it has retained the same analogy to pumps as 
these have to bellows. One of the oldest of modern rotary steam engines, 
that of Murdoch, was a copy of an old pump, a figure of which, No. 131, 
is taken from Serviere's collection. 

Two cog wheels, the teeth of which are fitted to work accurately into 
each other, are enclosed in an elliptical case. The sides of these wheels 



Chap. 5.] 



Rotary Tump from Serviere. 



285 




No. 131. Rotary Pump from Serviere. 



turn close to those of the case, so that water cannot enter between them. 
The axle of one of the wheels is continued through one side of the case, 
(which is removed in the figure to show the interior,) and the opening 
made tight by a stuffing box or collar of leather. A crank is applied to the 

end to turn it, and as one wheel revolves, 
it necessarily turns the other; the direc- 
tion of their motions being indicated by 
the arrows. The water that enters the 
lower part of the case is swept up the 
ends by each cog in rotation, and as it 
cannot return between the wheels in con- 
sequence of the cogs being there always 
in contact, it must necessarily rise in the 
ascending or forcing pipe. The machine 
is therefore both a sucking and forcing 
one. Of rotary pumps this is not only 
one of the oldest, but one of the best. 
Fire engines made on the same plan were 
patented about twenty-five years ago in 
England, and more recently pumps of 
the same kind, in this country. We have 
seen one with two elliptical wheels, 
which were so geared that the longer 
axis of one wheel might coincide (in one 
position) with the short one of the other. Sometimes a groove is made 
along the face of each cog, and a strip of leather or other packing se- 
cured in it. 

The pump figured above is believed to have been known long before 
Serviere's time, a model of it, as of other interesting machines, having 
been placed in his museum without regard to its origin. Ramelli is said 
to have described some similar ones in the middle of the 16th century, 
but we have not been able to procure a copy of his book. The suction 
pipe in the preceding figure has been added. In the original the water 
entered directly through the bottom of the case : the model was probably 
so made that part of the wheels might be visible, and the construction and 
operation of the machine more easily comprehended. 

Serviere was a French gentleman, born at Lyons in 1593. Indepen- 
dent in his circumstances, and inclined to mechanical researches, he was 
led to establish a cabinet of models of rare and curious machines — of 
these some were invented by himself and displayed uncommon ingenuity. 
It does not appear that any account of the whole was ever published ; a 
part only being included in the small volume edited by his grandson, the 
title of which we have given at the foot of page 63. That work is divided 
into three parts : the first relates to figures formed in the lathe, as spheres, 
cubes, ellipses, &c. ; some, being hollow and containing others within 
them, like Chinese balls, are extraordinary specimens of workmanship. 
There are also vases, urns, &c. not only round and elliptical, but angular, 
so that not only were the oval and eccentric chucks known to Serviere, 
but the lathe for turning irregular surfaces appears to have been used by 
him. The second part contains an account of clocks all made by himself, 
the mechanism of which is exceedingly ingenious. Some are moved by 
springs, others by weights, water, sand, &c. They are fully equal to any 
thing of the kind at the present day : indeed that beautiful device by 
which a small brass ball is made to traverse backwards and forwards across 
an inclined plane, which still retains a place among mantel clocks, is one 



286 Rotary Pumps. [Book III 

of Serviere's, besides several modifications of it equally interesting. One 
half of the third part is occupied with descriptions of machines for raising 
water : these consist of gutters, swapes, chain of pots, gaining and losing 
buckets, norias, tympanums and other wheels ; and lastly, pumps, among 
which is the rotary one figured above. Breval, in his " Remarks on Eu- 
rope," part ii, page 89, mentions several machines in Serviere's " famous 
cabinet of mechanicks" that are not noticed in the volume published by 
his grandson ; while others are inserted that were not invented till after 
his death, as Du Fay's improvement on the tympanum. 

Rotary pumps may be divided into classes according to the forms of 
and methods of working the pistons, or those parts that act as such : and 
according to the various modes by which the hutment is obtained. It is 
this last that receives the force of the water when impelled forward by 
the piston ; it also prevents the liquid from being swept by the latter en- 
tirely round the cylinder or exterior case, and compels it to enter the dis- 
charging pipe. In these particulars consist all the essential differences 
in rotary pumps. In some the butments are moveable pieces that are 
made to draw back to allow the piston to pass, when they are again 
protruded till its return ; in others, they are fixed and the pistons them- 
selves give way. It is the same with the latter ; they are sometimes per- 
manently connected to the axles by which they are turned, and some- 
times they are loose and drawn into recesses till the butments pass by. 
In another class the pistons are rectangular, or other shaped, pieces that 
turn on centres, something like the vanes of a horizontal wind mill, sweep- 
ing the water with their broad faces round the cylindrical case, till they 
approach that part which constitutes the butment, when they move edge- 
ways and pass through a narrow space which they entirely fill, and thereby 
prevent any water passing with them. In other pumps the butment is ob- 
tained by the contact of the peripheries of two wheels or cylinders, that 
roll on or rub against each other. No. 131 is of this kind — while the 
teeth in contact with the ends of the case act as pistons in driving the 
water before them, the others are fitted to work so closely on each other 
as to prevent its return. The next figure exhibits another modification of 
the same principle. 

In 1825 Mr. J. Eve, a citizen of the United States, obtained a patent 
in England for a rotary steam-engine- and pump. No. 132 will serve to 
explain its application to raise water. Within a cylindrical case a solid or 
hollow drum A is made to revolve, the sides of which are fitted to move 
close to those of the case. Three projecting pieces or pistons, of the same 
width as the drum, are secured to or cast on its periphery ; they are at 
equal distances from each other, and their extremities sweep close round 
the inner edge of the case, as shown in the figure. The periphery of the 
drum revolves in contact with that of a smaller cylinder B from which a 
portion is cut off to form a groove or recess sufficiently deep to receive 
within it each piston as it moves past. The diameter of the small cy- 
linder is just one third that of the drum. The axles of both are continued 
through one or both sides of the case, and the openings made tight with 
stuffing boxes. On one end of each axle is fixed a toothed wheel of the 
same diameter as its respective cylinder ; and these are so geared into 
one another, that when the crank attached to the drum axle is turned, (in 
the direction of the arrow,) the groove in the small cylinder receives suc- 
cessively each piston ; thus affording room for its passage, and at the same 
time by the contact of the edge of the piston with its curved part, prevent- 
ing water from passing. As the machine is worked the water that en- 
ters the lower part of the pump through the suction pipe, is forced round 



Chap. 5.] 



Rotary Pumps. 



287 



and compelled to rise in the discharging one, as indicated by the arrows. 
Other pumps of the same class have such a portion of the small cylin- 
der cut off, that the concave surface of the remainder forms a continuation 
of the case in front of the recess while the pistons are passing ; and then 
by a similar movement as that used in the figure described, the convex 
part is brought in contact with the periphery of the drum till the piston's 
return. 

All rotary pumps are both sucking and forcing machines, and are gene- 
rally furnished with valves in both pipes, as in the ordinary forcing pumps. 
The butments are always placed between the apertures of the sucking 
and forcing pipes. 




No. 132. 



No. 133. 



There is another class of pumps that bears some relationship to the pre- 
ceding — the eldest branch, we believe, of the same family. One of these is 
figured in the 133rd illustration : the butment consists of a curved flap that 
turns on a hinge ; it is so arranged as to be received into a recess formed 
on the rim or periphery of the case, and into which it is forced by the 
piston. The concave side of the flap is of the same curve as the rim of 
the case, and when pushed back forms a part of it. Its width is, of 
course, equal to that of the drum, against the rim of which its lower edge 
is pressed ; this is effected in some pumps by springs, in others by cams 
cog wheels, &c, fixed on the axles, as in the last one. The force by 
which the flap is urged against the drum must exceed the pressure of 
the liquid column in the discharging pipe. The semicircular pieces on the 
outer edge of the case represent ears for securing the pump to planks or 
frames, &c, when in use. The arrows in the figures show the direction 
in which the piston and water is moved. 

Such, machines have often been patented, both as pumps and steam- 
engines. In 1782 Mr. Watt thus secured a "rotative engine" of this kind, 
and in 1797 Mr. Cartwright inserted in the specification of his metallic pis- 
ton a description of another similar to Watt's, except that the case 
had two flaps, and three pistons were formed on the drum. In 1818 Mr. 
Routledge patented another with a single flap and piston, (Rep. of Arts, 
vol. xxxiii, 2d series ;) but the principle or prominent feature in all these 
had been applied long before by French mechanicians. Nearly a hun- 
dred years before the date of Watt's patent, Amontons communicated 
to the French Academy a description of a rotary pump substantially the 
same as represented in the last figure. It is figured and described in the 
first volume of Machines Approuv. p. 103 : the body of the pump or case 



S88 



Rotary Tump of the 16th Century. 



[Book III 



is a short cylinder, but the piston is elliptical, its transverse diameter be- 
ing equal to that of the cylinder, hence it performed the part of two pistons. 
There are also two flaps on opposite sides of the cylinder. A pump not 
unlike this of Amontons, with an elliptical case, is described in vol. iv. 
of Nicholson's Phil. Journal 466. Several similar ones have since been 
proposed. 

In other pumps the flaps, instead of acting as butments, are made to 
perform the part of pistons ; this is done by hinging them on the rim of 
the drum, of which, when closed, they also form a part : they are closed 
by passing under a permanent projecting piece or butment that extends 
from the case to the drum. 

In No. 134 the butment is movable A solid wheel, formed into three 
spiral wings that act as pistons, is turned round within a cylindrical case. 
The butment B is a piece of metal whose width is equal to the thickness 

of the wings, or the interior breadth of the 
cylinder : it is made to slide through a 
stuffing box on the top of the case, and by 
its weight to descend and rest upon the 
wings. Its upper part terminates in a rod, 
which, passing between two rollers, pre- 
serves it in a perpendicular position. As 
the wheel is turned, the point of each 
wing, (like the cogs of the wheels in 
No. 131,) pushes before it the water that 
enters the lower part of the cylinder, and 
drives it through the valve into the ascend- 
ing pipe A : at the same time the butment 
is gradually raised by the curved surface of 
the wing, and as soon as the end of the lat- 
ter passes under it, the load on the rod 
causes it instantly to descend upon the next 
one, which in its turn produces the same 
effect. This pump is as old as the 16th 
century, and probably was known much 
earlier. Besides the defects common to 
most of its species, it has one peculiar to 
itself : — as the butment must be loaded with weights sufficient to overcome 
the pressure of the liquid column over the valve, (otherwise it would itself 
be raised and the water would escape beneath it;) the power to work this 
pump is therefore more than double the amount which the water forced 
up requires. The instrument is interesting, however, as affording an il- 
lustration of the early use of the sliding valve and stuffing box ; and as 
containing some of the elements of recent rotary pumps and steam-engines. 
The pump represented by No. 135 consists also of an exterior case or 
short cylinder within which a small and solid one A is made to revolve. To 
the last an arm or piston is attached or cast in one piece with it, the 
sides and end of which are fitted to bear slightly against the sides and rim in 
the case. A butment B B slides backwards and forwards through a stuffing 
box, and is so arranged (by means of a cam or other contrivance connected 
to the axle of the small cylinder on the outside of the case) that it can be 
pushed into the interior as in the figure, and at the proper time be 
drawn back to afford a passage for the piston. Two openings near each 
other are made through the case on opposite sides of B B, and to these the 
suction and forcing pipes are united. Thus when the piston is moved 
in the direction of the arrow on the small cylinder, it pushes the water 




No. 134. Rotary Pump of the 16th 
century. 



Chap. 5.] 



Rotary Pumps. 



289 



before it, and the vacuity formed, behind is instantly filled with fresh por- 
tions driven up the suction pipe by the atmosphere ; and when the piston 
in its course descends past B B it sweeps this water up the same' way. 
Bramah and Dickenson adopted a modification of this machine in 1790, as 
a steam-engine and also as a pump. Rep. of Arts, vol. ii, 73. 




No. 135. 



No. 136. 



No. 136 represents another rotary engine. A figure of it is inserted the 
rather because it was reinvented here a few years ago by a mechanic who 
was greatly distressed on finding that he had been anticipated. A notice of 
it may therefore prevent others from experiencing a similar disappoint- 
ment. Like most others it consists of two concentric cylinders or drums, 
the annular space between them forming the pump chamber ; but the 
inner one, instead of revolving as in the preceding figures, is immovable, 
being fixed to the sides of the outer one or case. The piston is a rectan- 
gular and loose piece of brass or other metal accurately fitted to occupy 
und move in the space between the two cylinders. To drive the piston, 
and at the same time to form a butment between the orifices of the induc- 
tion and eduction pipes, a third cylinder is employed to which a revolving 
motion is imparted by a crank and axle in the usual way. This cylinder is 
eccentric to the others, and is of such a diameter and thickness that its in- 
terior and exterior surfaces touch the inner and outer cylinders as repre- 
sented in the cut, the places of contact preventing water from passing t 
a slit or groove equal in width to the thickness of the piston is made 
through its periphery, into which slit the piston is placed. When turned in 
the direction of the large arrow, the water in the lower part of the pump 
is swept round and forced up the rising pipe, and the void behind the 
piston is again filled by water from the reservoir into which the lower 
pipe is inserted. This machin: was originally designed, like most rotary 
pumps, for a steam engine. It was patented in England by Mr. John 
Trotter, of London, in 1805, and is described in the Repertory of Arts, 
vol. ix, 2d series. As a matter li course, he contemplated its application 
to raise water : — " The said engine he observes] may be used to raise 
or give motion to fluids in any direction whatever." 

In others the pistons slide within a revolving cylinder or drum that is 
concentric with the exterior one. No. 137 is a specimen of a French 
pump of this kind. The butment in the orm of a segment is secured to 
the inner circumference of the case, and the drum turns against it at the 
centre of the chord line : on both sides of the place of contact it is curved to 
the extremities of the arc, and the .ucking and forcing pipes communicate 

37 



290 



Rotary Pumps. 



[Book III. 



with the pump through it, as represented in the figure. To the centre of 
one or both ends of the case is screwed fast a thick piece of brass whose 
outline resembles that of the letter D : the flattened side is placed towards 
the butment and is so formed that the same distance is preserved between 
it and the opposite parts of the butment, as between its convex surface and 
the rim of the case. The pistons, as in the last figure, are rectangular 
pieces of stout metal, and are dropped into slits made through the rim of 
the drum, their length being equal to that of the case, and their width to 
the distance between its rim and the D piece. They are moved by a 
crank attached to the drum axle. To lessen the friction and compensate 
for the wear of the butment, that part of the latter against which the drum 
turns is sometimes made hollow ; a piece of brass is let into it and 
pressed against the periphery of the drum by a spring. 




No. 137. 



No. 138. 



In No. 138 the axis of the drum or smaller cylinder is so placed as to 
cause its periphery to rub against the inner circumference of the case. 
Two rectangular pistons, whose length are equal to the internal diame- 
ter of the case, cross each other at right angles, being notched so as to 
allow them to slide backwards and forwards to an extent equal to the 
widest space between the two cylinders. The case of this pump is not 
perfectly cylindrical, but of such a form that the four ends of the pistons 
are always in contact with it. An axle on the drum is moved by a crank. 
This pump, and another similar to it, were described in Bramah and 
Dickenson's patent for three rotative steam-engines in 1790. Rep. of Arts, 
vol. ii, 85. Fire engines have been made on the same principle. 

Another class of rotary pumps have their pistons made somewhat like 
the vanes of wind mills. They were originally designed as steam-engines, 
and were, if we mistake not, first introduced by Hornblower, in the latter 
part of the last century. He employed four revolving vanes which were 
so arranged that, while one passed edgeways through a narrow cavity 
which it filled, the opposite one presented its face to the action of the 
steam. These machines have been variously modified as pumps, but ge- 
nerally speaking they are more complex and of course more liable to de- 
rangement than others : we have known two of them, fifteen inches dia- 
meter and apparently well made, (at a cost of 150 dollars,) which a friend 
used to force water to an elevation of twenty feet, become deranged, and 
thrown aside as useless in the course of three or four weeks. 

A centrifugal forcing pump may be made by enclosing the arms of an 
atmospheric one, (such as rep 1 esented at No. 95, page 229,) in a closo 



Chap. 5.] Rotary Pumps. 291 

drum or case, to which an ascending or forcing pipe is attached: the 
water would rise through the pipe, provided the velocity of the arms was 
increased according to the elevation of its discharging orifice. In place of 
tubular arms, two or more vanes radiating from a vertical axis and turned 
rapidly in the case would produce the same effect ; the suction pipe 
being connected to the bottom at the centre and the forcing pipe to the 
rim or the top. Such pumps are in their construction simpler than other 
rotary ones, besides which no particular accuracy is required in fitting 
their "working parts ; nevertheless, they are as liable to derangement as 
others, for the velocity required to be given to the arms is so great, that 
the teeth of the wheels and pinions by which motion is transmitted to them 
are soon worn out. 

Centrifugal pumps like those just described have been tried as substi- 
tutes for paddle wheels of steam-vessels : i. e. the wheels were con- 
verted into such pumps by inclosing them in cases made air-tight, except 
at the bottom through which the ends of the paddles slightly projected ; 
a large suction pipe proceeded from one side of each case (near its cen- 
tre) through the bows of the vessel and terminated below the water line : 
by the revolution of the wheels water was drawn through these tubes into 
the cases and forcibly ejected below in the direction of the stern, and by 
the reaction moved the vessel forward. 

It must not be supposed that the preceding observations include an ac- 
count of all rotary pumps. We have only particularized a few out of a 
great multitude, such as may serve as types of the various classes to which 
they belong. Were a detailed description given of the numerous forms 
of these machines, modes of operation, devices for opening and closing the 
valves, moving the pistons, diminishing friction, compensating for the wear 
of certain parts, for packing the pistons, &c. &c, those readers who are 
not familiar with their history would be surprised at the ingenuity dis- 
played, and would be apt to conclude that all the sources of mechanical 
combinations had been exhausted on them. We would advise every 
mechanic who thinks he has discovered an improvement in rotary pumps, 
carefully to examine the Repertory of Arts, the Transactions of the So- 
ciety of Arts, the London Mechanics' Magazine, and particularly the 
Journal of the Franklin Institute of Pennsylvania, before incurring the 
expenses of a patent, or those incident to the making of models and 
experiments. 

Rotary pumps have never retained a permanent place among machines 
for raising water : they are, as yet, too complex and too easily deranged 
to be adapted for common use. Theoretically considered they are per- 
fect machines, but the practical difficulties attending their construction 
have hitherto rendered them (like rotary steam engines) inferior to others. 
To make them efficient, their working parts require to be adjusted to each 
other with unusual accuracy and care, and even when this is accomplished, 
their efficiency is, by the unavoidable wear of those parts, speedily dimi- 
nished or destroyed : their first cost is greater than that of common pumps, 
and the expense of keeping them in order exceeds that of others ; they 
cannot, moreover, be repaired by ordinary workmen, since peculiar tools 
are required for the purpose — a farmer might almost as well attempt to 
repair a watch as one of these machines. Hitherto, a rotary pump has 
been like the Psalmist's emblem of human life : — " Its days are as grass, 
as a flower of the field it flourisheth, the wind [of experience] passeth 
over it, and it is gone" Were we inclined to prophecy, we should pre- 
dict that in the next century, as in the present one, the cylindrical pump 
will retain its preeminence over all others ; and that makers of the ordi- 



292 



Reciprocating Rotary Pumps. 



[Book III 



nary wooden ones will then, as now, defy all attempts to supersede the 
object of their manufacture. 

Reciprocating rotary pumps : — One of the obstacles to be overcome 
in making a rotary pump, is the passage of the piston over the butment, 
or over the space it occupies. The apparatus for moving the butment as 
the piston approaches to or recedes from it, adds to the complexity of the 
machine ; nor is this avoided when that part is fixed, for an equivalent 
movement is then required to be given to the piston itself in addition to 
its ordinary one. In reciprocating rotary pumps these difficulties are 
avoided by stopping the piston when it arrives at one side of the butment 
and then reversing its motion towards the other ; hence these are less com- 
plex than the former : they are, however, liable to some of the same objec- 
tions, being more expensive than common pumps, more difficult to repair, 
and upon the whole less durable. Their varieties may be included in 
two classes according to the construction of the pistons ; those that are 
furnished with valves forming one, and such as have none the other. The 
range of the pistons in these pumps varies greatly; in some the arc des- 
cribed by them does not exceed 90°, while in others they make nearly a 
complete revolution. They are of old date, various modifications of them 
having been proposed in the 16th century. No. 139 consists of a close 
case of the form of a sector of a circle, having an opening at the bottom 
for the admission of water, and another to which a forcing pipe with its 
valve is attached. A movable radius or piston is turned on a centre by 
a lever as represented ; thus, when the latter is pulled down towards the 
left, the former drives the contents of the case through the valve in the 
ascending pipe. 





No. 139. 



No. 140. 



Belidor has described a similar pump in the first volume of his Arch. 
Hydraul. 379. The case is a larger portion of a circle than that of No. 
139, and the piston is furnished with a valve. A pump on the same prin- 
ciple was adopted by Bramah as a fire-engine in 1793 : His was a short 
cylinder, to the movable axle of which two pistons were attached that 
extended quite across, and had an opening covered by a clack in each. 

No. 140 consists of a short horizontal cylinder : a portion of the lower 
part is separated from the rest by a plate where the suction pipe termi- 
nates in two openings that are covered by clacks c c. The partition A 



Chap. 6.] Application of Pumps in Modern Water-works. 293 

extends through the entire length of the cylinder and is made air and 
water tight to both ends, and also to the plate upon which its lower edge 
rests. The upper edge extends to the under side of the axle to \vhich 
the piston B is united. One end of the axle is passed through the cylin- 
der and the opening made tight by a stuffing box ; it is moved by a crank 
or lever. Near the clacks c c two other openings are made through the 
plate, to which two forcing pipes are secured. These tubes are bent 
round the outside of the cylinder and meet in the chamber C where their 
orifices are covered by clacks. Thus when the piston is turned in either 
direction, it drives the water before it through one or other of these tubes ; 
at the same time the void left behind it is kept filled by the pressure of 
the atmosphere on the surface of the liquid in which the lower orifice of 
the suction pipe is placed. The edges of the pistons are made to work 
close to the ends and rim of the cylinder by means of strips of leather 
screwed to them. Modifications of these pumps have also been used in 
England as fire-engines. 

Reciprocating rotary pumps have sprung up at different times both here 
and in Europe, and have occasionally obtained " a local habitation and a 
name," but have never become perfectly domesticated, we believe, in any 
country. We have seen some designed for ordinary use that were ele- 
gantly finished, and decorated with gilding and japan — they resembled 
those exotic plants which require peculiar care, and are rather for orna- 
ment than for use. 

Reciprocating rotary pumps have also been proposed as steam-engines. 
Watt patented one in 1782. 



CHAPTER VI. 

Application of pumps in modern water-works : First used by the Germans — Water-works at Augs- 
burgh and Bremen — Singular android in the latter city— Old water-works at Toledo— At London bridge 
— Other London works moved by horses, water, wind and steam — Water engine at Exeter — Water- 
works erected on Pont Neuf and Pont Notre Dame at Paris — Celebrated works at Marli — Error of Rau- 
nequin in making them unnecessarily complex. American water-works : A history of them desirable — 
Introduction of pumps into wells in New-York city — Extracts from the minutes of the Common Council 
previous to the war of Independence — Public water-works proposed and commenced in 1774 — Trea- 
sury notes issued to meet the expense — Copy of one — Manhattan Company — Water-works at Fair 
Mount, Philadelphia. 

Before noticing another and a different class of machines, we propose 
to occupy this and the two next chapters with observations on the em- 
ployment of pumps in " water- works," and as engines to extinguish fires 
— both in this country and in Europe. 

The hydraulic machinery for supplying modern cities with water gene- 
rally consists of a series of forcing pumps very similar to the machine of 
Ctesibius, (No. 120 ;) and when employed to raise water from rapid 
streams, or where from tides or dams a sufficient current can be obtained, 
are worked like it by under or by overshot wheels. An account of old 
European water-works is an important desideratum, for it would throw 
light on the history of pumps in the middle ages, during which little or 
nothing respecting them is known. The older cities of Germany were the 
first in modern days that adopted them to raise water for public purposes; 
but of their construction, materials, and application under various circum 
stances, we have no information in detail. Rivius, in his Commentary on 



294 Pump Engines in Germany. [Book III. 

the machine of Ctesibius, speaks of pumps worked by water wheels as 
then common, (A. D. 1548.) The hydraulic engines at Augsburgh were 
at one time greatly celebrated. They are mentioned, but not described, 
by Misson and other travelers of the 17th century. They raised the water 
130 feet. Blainville, in 1705, speaks of them as among the curiosities of 
the city. He observes — " The towers which furnish water to this city are 
also curious. They are near the gate called the Red Port, upon a branch 
of the Leek which runs through the city. Mills which go day and night, 
by means of this torrent, work a great many pumps, which raise water in 
large leaden pipes to the highest story in these towers. In the middle of 
a chamber on each of them, which is very neatly and handsomely ceil- 
in g'd, is a reservoir of a hexagonal figure, into which the water is carried 
by a large pipe, the extremity of which is made like a dolphin, and through 
an urn or vase held by a statue sitting in the middle of the reservoir. 
One of these towers sends water to all the public fountains by smaller 
pipes, and the three others supply with water a thousand houses in the 
city ; each of which pays about eight crowns yearly, and receives a hun- 
dred and twenty pretty large measures of water every hour." Travels, 
vol. i, 250. Misson's Travels, 5 ed. vol. i, 137. 

Contemporary with the engines at Augsburgh was one at Bremen that 
is mentioned by several writers of the 17th century. It was erected on 
one of the bridges and moved by a water wheel : it raised water into a 
reservoir at a considerable elevation, whence the liquid was distributed 
to all parts of the city. An old author when speaking of it, mentions an 
android in Bremen, a species of mechanism for which the Germans were 
at one time famous. At the entrance of the arsenal, he observes, " stands 
the figure of a warrior arm'd cap-a-pe, who, by mechanism under the 
steps, as soon as you tread on them, lifts up the bever of his helmet with 
his truncheon to salute you." 

There was also a celebrated water-engine at Toledo, the former capital 
of Spain. It raised the water of the Tagus to the top of the Alcazar, a 
magnificent palace erected on the summit of the declivity on which the city 
. built ; the elevation being " five hundred cubits from the surface of the 
river." What the particular construction of this machine was we have 
not been able to ascertain, nor whether it was originally erected by the 
Moors who built the palace. It is mentioned by Moreri as a "wonderful 
hydraulic engine which draws up the water from the river Tagus to so 
great a height, that it is thence conveyed in pipes to the whole city ;" but 
in the middle of the last century (1751) the author of the Grand Gazetteer, 
or Topographic Dictionary, remarks (page 1289) that this " admirable 
engine" was then " entirely ruined." 

The introduction of pump engines into the public water- works of Eng- 
land and France is sufficiently ascertained. This did not take place till 
long after they had been employed in Germany ; and both London and 
Paris were indebted to engineers of that country for the first machines to 
raise water from the Thames and the Seine. Previous to their introduc- 
tion, cities were commonly supplied from springs by means of pipes. As 
early as A. D. 1236, the corporation of London commenced to lay a six 
inch leaden pipe from some springs at Tyburn, a village at that time some 
miles distant from the city. This is supposed to have been the first at- 
tempt to convey water to that city through pipes, and fifty years elapsed 
before the whole was completed. These pipes were formed of sheet lead 
and the seams were soldered : part of them was accidentally discovered 
in 1745 while making some excavations, and another portion in 1765. ( Lon- 
don Mag. for 1765, p. 377.) In 1439 the abbot of Westminster, in whom 






Chap. 6.] London Water-works. 295 

the right of the soil was vested, granted " to Robert Large the mayor and 
citizens of London, and their successors, one head [reservoir] of water, 
containing twenty-six perches in length and one in breadth, together with 
all its springs in the manor of Paddington : in consideration of which 
grant, the city is for ever to pay to the said abbot or his successors, at the 
feast of St. Peter, two pepper corns." This grant was confirmed by Henry 
VI, who at the same time authorized the mayor and citizens, by a writ of 
the privy seal, to purchase two hundred fothers of lead " for the intended 
works of pipes and conduits, and to impress plumbers and labourers." 
Maitland's Hist, of London, pp. 48, 107. 

In the 33d year of Henry VIII, the mayor of the city of Glocester, with 
the dean of the church there, w T ere authorized to " convey w T ater in pipes 
of lead, gutters and trenches'' from a neighbouring hill, " satisfying the 
owners of the ground there for the dig^ms: thereof." a In the following: 

o DO O O 

year, the mayor and burgesses of Poole were authorized to erect a wind 
mill on the king's waste ground, and a conduit head sixteen feet square, 
" and to dig and draw [water] in, by, through and upon all places meet 
and convenient, into and from the same, &c. — yielding yearly to the king 
and his heirs one pepper corn." b It would appear that the reservoir was in 
too low a situation for its contents to flow through pipes to the town, and 
hence the wind mill to raise it sufficiently for that purpose. The machine 
used was probably the chain of pots, which, as remarked page 125, was at 
that time often employed in such cases. In the 35th of Henry VIII, the 
corporation of London was authorized to draw water through pipes from 
various villages and other places within five miles of the city, and for this 
purpose to enter any grounds not enclosed with " stone, brick or mud 
walls, and there to dig pits, trenches and ditches ; to erect heads, lay 
pipes, and make vaults and suspirals," &c. Two years afterwards, (A. D. 
1546,) a law was passed by which those who destroyed conduit heads and 
pipes, were put to death. c In 1547, William Lamb conveyed water in a 
leaden pipe from a conduit or spring, which still bears his name. d 

In 1582, the first pump machines were used in London. In that year 
Peter Maurice, a German engineer, proposed to erect a machine on the 
Thames for the more effectual supply of the city, " which being approved 
of, he erected the same in the river near London bridge, which by suction 
and pressure, through pumps and valves, raised water to such a height as 
to supply the uppermost rooms of the loftiest buildings, in the highest 
part of the city therewith, to the great admiration of all. This curious 
machine, the first of the kind that ever was seen in England, was so highly 
approved of, that the lord mayor and common council, as an encourage- 
ment for the ingenious engineer to proceed in so useful an undertaking, 
granted him the use of one of the arches of London bridge to place his 
engine in, for the better w T orking thereof." e Maurice's engine consisted 
of a series of forcing pumps (similar to Nos. 118 and 121) seven inches in 
diameter, and the pistons had a stroke of thirty inches ; they were worked 
by an undershot wheel that was placed under one of the arches and 
turned by the current, during the rise and fall of the tide ; the water 
was raised to an elevation of 120 feet. The number of pumps and wheels 
was subsequently increased ; but in 1822, when the old bridge was taken 
down, the whole were removed/ 

Two years before Maurice undertook to raise water from the Thames, 
Stow says — " One Russel proposed to bring water from Islew T orth, viz : 

a Statutes at large. Lon. 1631. b Ibid. c Ibid. ^Maitland, 158. e Ibid. 160. 
f A description of the London Bridge Water-works, by Beighton, may be seen in the 
Philos. Trans, vol. vi, 353, and in Desaguliers' Philos. ii, 436. 



296 French Water-works. [Book III. 

the river Uxbridge to the said north of London ; and that by a geometrical 
instrument : he propounded the invention to Lord Burleigh." In 1594, 
Bevis Bulmer, an English engineer, undertook to supply a small district 
of the city with Thames water, which he raised by four pumps that were 
worked by horses. They were continued in use till the time that Mait- 
land commenced his history, viz : to 1725. The pumps of other London 
works were moved by horses, by wind mills, and others by the current 
of the common sewer. a About the year 1767, one of Newcomen's steam- 
engines was erected at the London bridge works to raise water at neap 
tides, and also as a security against fire during the turning of the tide, 
when the wheels were consequently at rest. A company was incorpo- 
rated in 1691 to supply the neighbourhood of York Buildings with Thames 
water: Newcomen's engines were employed; and the pumps had solid 
plungers, one of which we have figured and described at page 272 — 
Maitland enumerates them among other causes of the company's embarrass- 
ments : " the directors, by purchasing estates, erecting new water-works 
[new machines for raising water] and other pernicious projects, have almost 
ruined the corporation ; however, their chargeable engines for raising 
water by fire, being laid aside, they continue to work that of horses, which, 
together with their estates in England and Scotland, may in time restore 
the company's affairs." 5 A figure of this chargeable engine is inserted in 
the second volume of La Motraye's Travels. 

The author of the Grand Gazetteer, a folio of nearly 1500 pages, pub- 
lished in 1751, was a native of Exeter, on which account he excuses him- 
self for describing that city at large ; after mentioning some ancient con- 
duits he observes : — " this city is otherwise well watered, and not only by 
most houses of note having wells and pumps of their own, but by the river 
water being forced by a curious water-engine, through pipes of bored trees 
laid under ground, even up to the very steep hill at Northgate Street ; 
and then by pipes of lead into the houses of such inhabitants as pay a very 
moderate price for such benefit. The said water house and engine were 
begun about Anno. 1694." This extract shows that at the close of the 17th 
century, such works were not very common in English cities : of this there 
are numerous indications : thus at Norwich " the water- works at the new 
mills were undertaken in 1697, and completed in about two years. " c 

During the reign of Henry IV of France, John Lintlaer, a Fleming, 
erected an engine consisting of lifting pumps (such as No. 125) at the Pont 
Neuf which were worked by the current of the Seine. The water was 
raised above the bridge and conveyed in pipes to the Louvre and Tuille- 
ries. This engine received the appellation of The Samaritan, from bronze 
figures of Christ and the woman of Samaria, which decorated the front of 
the building in which it was enclosed. The success that attended this 
experiment, led to the erection of similar engines at Pont Notre Dame, a 
figure of one of the pumps of which is inserted at page 277. 

The most elaborate machine ever constructed for raising water was 
probably the famous one at Marli, near Paris, for supplying the public 
gardens at Versailles from the Seine. It was designed by Rannequin, a 
Dutch engineer, and set to work in 1682, at a cost of eight millions of 
livres — about a million and half of dollars. d We are not aware that any 
description of it in detail was ever published till Belidor inserted a short 
account in the second volume of his Architecture Hydraulique in 1739 ; 
and such was its magnitude and the multiplicity of its parts, that he was 

» Maitland, pp. 622, 628. b Ibid 634. c Norfolk Tour, Norwich, 1793. 
d Desaguliers says "eighty millions, about four millions of pounds sterling," bui 
Belidor has only eight. 



Chap. 6.] Water-works at Marli. 297 

for a long time unwilling to undertake its elucidation, on account of the 
difficulty of describing it with sufficient precision. Its general features 
may be sketched in a few words, but a volume of letter-press and another 
of plates, would be required to explain and delineate the whole minutely. 

The reservoir or head of the aqueduct, into which water from the 
Seine was raised by this machine, was constructed on the top of a hill, 
614 toises, or three quarters of a mile, from the river, and at an elevation 
of 533 feet (English) above it. To obtain a sufficient motive power, the 
river was barred up by a dam, and its whole width divided, by piles, into 
fourteen distinct water courses, into each of which a large undershot wheel 
was erected. The wheels, by means of cranks attached to both .ends of 
their axles, imparted motion to a number of vibrating levers, and through 
these to the piston rods of between 200 and 300 sucking and forcing 
pumps ! The pumps were divided into three separate sets. The first con- 
tained 64, which were placed near the river, and were worked by six of 
the wheels : they drew the water, by short suction pipes, out of the river 
and forced it through iron pipes, up the hill ; but instead of these pipes 
being continued directly to the reservoir, (which might have been done 
by making them and the machinery of sufficient strength,) Rannequin 
made them terminate in a large cistern, built for the purpose, at the dis- 
tance from the river of 100 fathoms only, and at an elevation of about 160 
feet. In this cistern he then placed 79 other pumps (the second set) to 
force the water thence to another cistern 224 fathoms further up the hill, 
and at an elevation of 185 feet above the other. In this last cistern 82 
pumps more (the third set) were fixed, which forced the contents to the 
reservoir. 

In thus dividing the work, Rannequin made a mistake for which no in- 
genuity could compensate : as the second and third sets of pumps con- 
taining no less than one hundred and sixty-one, with all the apparatus for 
working them, merely transferred through a part of the distance, the water 
which the first set drew directly from the river, they were in reality un- 
necessary, because the first set might have been made to force it through 
the whole distance ; hence they not only uselessly consumed (at least) 
four fifths of the power employed, but they rendered the whole mass of 
machinery cumbersome and complicated in the highest degree ; and con- 
sequently extremely inefficient, and subject to continual repairs. The 
first set of pumps, as already observed, were worked by the wheels near 
which they were placed, and the remaining wheels imparted motion to 
the piston rods of the second and third sets, in the two cisterns on the hill: 
of these, therefore, eighty-two pumps were stationed at an elevation of 
upwards of three hundred feet above the power that worked them ; and 
nearly half a mile from it ! and seventy-nine were one hundred fathoms 
from the wheel, and 160 feet above them! To work these pumps, a num- 
ber of chains, or jointed iron rods, were extended on frames above the 
ground, all the way from the cranks on the water wheels in the river to 
both cisterns, where they were connected to the vibrating beams to which 
the piston rods were attached. It was the transmission of power to such 
elevations and extraordinary distances by these chains, that acquired for 
the machine the title of" a monument of ignorance." 

A writer in the Penny Magazine (vol. iv, page 240) who examined the 
machine in 1815, says the sound of these rods working was like that of a 
number of wagons loaded with bars of iron running down a hill with 
axles never greased. The creaking and clanking (he observes) must have 
convinced the most ignorant person that the expenditure of power was 
enormously beyond what was required for the purpose effected. It has 

38 



298 American Water-works. [Book III 

been estimated that 95 per cent of the power was expended in communi- 
cating motion to the apparatus ! 

The evil of working the pumps with shafts and chains at such great 
distances from the power, was seen a few years after the machine was 
completed. In 1738 an attempt was made by M. Camus to raise the 
water to the reservoir by a single lift. The attempt succeeded but par- 
tially, and the machine was much strained by the extraordinary effort, 
chiefly because only a small portion of the power was used ; viz : those 
wheels that raised the water into the first cistern; the others which moved 
the shafts and chains abovementioned, not being applicable for the pur- 
pose. But even this comparatively small power forced the water to tho 
reservoir, and thus demonstrated the practicability of completing the work 
at one throw, if the whole apparatus had been adapted accordingly. No- 
thing more was done for nearly forty years, and the machine proceeded 
as before till 1775, when another trial was made to raise the water only 
to the second cistern : this succeeded, and it was then hoped that the first 
cistern would be dispensed with ; but many of the old pipes burst from 
the undue strain upon them, financial difficulties impeded their renewal, 
and the old plan was once more resorted to. The water wheels at last 
fell into decay and were replaced by a steam engine, of sixty-four horse 
power, by order of Napoleon; but the old shafts, chains, pipes and cisterns, 
&c. still remain. 

We have mentioned only 225 pumps, but there were in all upwards of 
250 ; some being feeders to others, and to keep water always over the 
pistons of those near the river. As each pump had two valves, an im- 
mense quantity of water must have escaped at every stroke on the open- 
ing and closing of 500 of these ; to which may be added that which leaked 
past the leathers or packing of the pistons, and through the innumerable 
joints. The 64 pumps near the river were placed in a perpendicular posi- 
tion and had solid pistons. They resembled No. 118, except that the suck- 
1 ing as well as forcing pipes were united to the sides of the cylinders : 
those in the cisterns had hollow pistons, and the cylinders were inverted 
and immersed in the water : one of them is represented at No. 126. 

American water-works. — A history of these is desirable and is cer- 
tainly due to posterity. There are circumstances connected with their 
origin, plans, progress and execution, especially in the older cities of the 
Union, of Mexico and the Canadas, that ought to be preserved. An ac- 
count of them would be useful to future engineers, and, as a record of his- 
torical and statistical facts, would include matter of general interest in com- 
ing times. The circumstances attending the first use of pumps and fire- 
engines, &c. may now be deemed too trifling to deserve particular notice, 
but they will increase in interest as time grows older. When the destiny 
that awaits the republic is accomplished — when the continent becomes 
studded with cities from one ocean to the other, and civilization, science 
and self government pervade the whole, then every incident relating to the 
early cultivation of the useful arts and improvements of machinery will be 
sought for with avidity and be dwelt upon with delight. Why should not 
the introduction of the most useful materials, manufactures and implements 
into this mighty continent form episodes in its history, as well as the 
fleece, the auger, saw, or bellows in that of classic Greece ] And why 
should not the names of those persons be preserved from oblivion who 
here made the first pump and fire-engine, the first cog wheel and steam- 
engine — who built the first ship, forged the first anchor, erected the first 
saw, slitting, or grist mill — who made the first plough, grew the first wheat, 
raised the first silk, wove the first web, cast the first type, made the first 



Chap. 6.] Introduction of Pumps into Wells in New-York. 



299 



paper, printed the first book, &c. &c. 1 It is such men as these and their 
t successors, that found, strengthen and enrich a nation — who, without os- 
tentation or parade, promote its real independence — men, whose labors 
should be mentioned in the national archives with honor, and whose stc- 
tues and portraits should occupy the niches and panels of the capitol. 

The precise time when pumps were first introduced into New- York is 
uncertain. This city, as is well known, was founded by the Dutch in 1614, 
who gave it the appellation of New- Amsterdam, and to the colony that of 
New-Netherlands ; names that were continued till the British, in 1664, 
took possession of both and imposed the present ones. In examining the 
manuscript Dutch records in the office of the clerk of the Common Coun- 
cil : (a volume of which including the period that extends from May 29, 
1647, to 1661, has been translated,) we have not met with any reference 
to pumps, either in wells or as fire-engines. In the first volume of " Mi- 
nutes of the Common Council" (in manuscript) which embraces the trans- 
actions from October 1675 to October 1691, are several ordinances relating 
to wells, but no mention is made of pumps or other devices by which the 
water was raised. In the second volume under the date of August 31, 1694, 
a resolution directed that " the public wells within the city be repaired as 
formerly." From the following extract it appears that the water was 
raised by a cord and bucket, a windlass, or a swape : September 24, 1700, 
" Ordered that the neighbourhood that live adjacent to the king's farm 
and have benefit of the public well there built, do contribute to the charge 
thereof in proportion, or else be debarred from drawing water there." 

In the third volume, containing minutes from February 1702 to March 
1722, are notices respecting wells to be dug and others to be filled up, but 
nothing is said respecting pumps being placed in any. The same remark 
applies to the fourth volume, including a period of eighteen years, viz ; 
from April 1722 to September 1740 ; and yet it would seem that pumps 
were at this last date used in some of the public wells, for in the fifth 
volume under the date of October 25, 1741, they are referred to in a " draft 
of a bill for mending and keeping in repair the public wells and pumps in 
this city ;" and again November 8, 1752, a bill was before the corporation 
"for keeping in repair the public wells and pumps; and January 10, 1769, 
two hundred pounds [were] ordered to be raised " for mending and keeping 
in repair the public wells and pumps." The precise period when pumps 
were first introduced is therefore uncertain: but from the language of the 
minute of October 1741, it would appear that they had then been some 
time in use in public wells ; and from another minute in the same volume, 
in private wells also, for it was ordered that "the pump" of an individual 
should be deemed a public one and kept in repair at the public expense, 
on an application to that effect being made by the owner. 

From the rapid growth of the city a the number of wells was increased, 
as now, every year, and in 1774 measures were taken to insure a more 
abundant supply from a large well in the Collect, the water to be raised 
by machinery and distributed through the city in wooden pipes. On the 
22d April of that year, Christopher Coles proposed to the corporation 
" to erect a reservoir and to convey water through the several streets of 
this city." The proposition was subsequently approved of, and Mr. Coles 
directed " to enlarge the well and proceed." A committee was appointed 



In 1696 the population was 4,302 

1731 6,628 

1756 10,381 

1773 21,876 

1786 23,614 



1790 . 


. 33,131 


1825 . 


. 167,059 


1800 . 


. 60,489 


1830 . 


. 203,007 


1810 . 


. 96,373 


1835 . 


. 270,089 


1820 . 


. 123,706 


1840 . 


312,932 



300 Philadelphia Water-works. [Book III. 

to assist him and to superintend the works, and several contracts were 
made for materials. To meet the expense .=£2500 in treasury notes were 
ordered to be issued, and subsequently further amounts were printed and 
issued. One of the small notes is now in the possession of John Lozier, 
Esq., superintendent of the Manhattan water-works, and is in these words: 

NEW-YORK WATER-WORKS. 

No. 3842. 
This note shall entitle the bearer to the sum of TWO SHILLINGS, 
current money of the colony of New- York, payable on demand, by th^ 
Mayor, Aldermen and Commonalty of the city of New- York, at the office 
of chamberlain of the said city, pursuant to a vote of the said Mayor, Al- 
dermen and Commonalty of this date. Dated the second day of August, the 
year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and seventy-five. 

By order of the Corporation, Wm. Waddell, 

ii s. J. H. Cruger. 

It appears that the well (near White street) was enlarged, and a reser- 
voir built, but no pipes were laid nor machinery to raise water erected 
before the war broke out and put a stop to the work. The project was 
not again revived till 1797, when the Manhattan Company was incorpo- 
rated : the present wells were then made and the water raised by three 
or four common forcing pumps, worked by horses. These pumps raised 
the water by atmospheric pressure twenty-five feet, and forced it forty 
feet higher, into a reservoir in the Park where the post office is now (1840) 
located. In 1804 the pumps were replaced by two double acting ones 
(No. 122) fifteen inches in diameter and with a stroke of four feet. They 
were and still are worked by one of Watt's steam-engines. The water 
is raised to the same elevation as before. These works will probably 
be discontinued as soon as the Croton aqueduct, now being constructed, 
is finished. 

The first water-works of Philadelphia were commenced in 1799, and 
consisted of forcing pumps, worked by steam-engines which raised water 
from the Schuylkill into a reservoir constructed, at an elevation of 50 feet, 
on the banks of that river ; and from which it was conveyed to the city 
in pipes of bored logs. In 1811 the " city councils" appointed a com- 
mittee to devise means for procuring a more perfect supply than these 
works afforded : and shortly after it was determined to erect two steam- 
engines and pumps on another location, viz : at Fair Mount, two miles 
and a half from the city, and near the upper bridge that crosses the Schuyl- 
kill. A reservoir 318 feet in length, 167 in width, and 10 in depth, was 
made at an elevation of 98 feet, into which the pumps forced water from 
the river. 

The great expense attending the employment of steam-engines led to 
the adoption (in 1819) of water as the moving power. A dam was erected, 
and in 1822 three water wheels were put in operation ; these, by cranks 
on their axles imparted motion through a connecting rod to the pistons of 
the pumps. In addition to the water consumed in turning these wheels, 
a surplus remained to work five additional ones, whenever the wants of 
the city might require them. An additional reservoir was also made, 
which contains four millions of gallons. The water in both is 102 feet 
above low tide, and 56 above the highest ground in the city. Iron pipes 
were also substituted for the old wooden ones. The whole was executed 
under the directions of F. Graft", Esq. 

We took the opportunity while at Philadelphia in October of the pre- 



Chap. 6.] A fine specimen of Hydraulic Machinery. 301 

sent year (1840) to visit Fair Mount. Six breast wheels (15 feet long and 
16 feet in diameter) were in operation ; each, by a crank on one end of 
its axle, communicating motion to the piston rod of a single pump. a The 
pumps are double acting, the same as figured and described at page 271. 
They are placed a little below the axles of the wheels and in nearly a ho- 
rizontal position. The cylinders are 16 inches diameter; and, that the 
water may not be pinched in its passage into and escape from them, the 
induction and eduction pipes are of the same bore; and all angles or 
abrupt changes in their direction and those of the mains are avoided. The 
stroke of two or three of the pumps was four feet, and their wheels made 
fourteen revolutions per minute : the others had a stroke of five feet ten 
inches, and the wheels performed eleven revolutions in a minute, conse- 
quently the contents of the cylinders of the latter were emptied into the 
reservoirs twenty-two times in the same period, and those of the former 
twenty-eight times. The cylinders are fed under a head of water from 
the forebays and they force it to an elevation of 96 feet, through a dis- 
tance of 290. An air chamber is adapted to each. 

It is impossible to examine these works without paying homage to the 
science and skill displayed in their design and execution ; in these res- 
pects no hydraulic works in the Union can compete, nor do we believe 
they are excelled by any in the world. Not the smallest leak in any of 
the joints was discovered ; and, with the exception of the water rushing 
on the wheels, the whole operation of forcing up daily millions of gallons 
into the reservoirs on the mount, and thus furnishing in abundance one of 
the first necessaries of life to an immense population — was performed with 
less noise than is ordinarily made in working a smith's bellows ! The 
picturesque location, the neatness that reigns in the buildings, the walks 
around the reservoirs and the grounds at large, with the beauty of the sur- 
rounding scenery, render the name of this place singularly appropriate. 

Dr. T. P. Jones, the talented editor of the Journal of the Franklin In- 
stitute, promised his readers " A history of the origin, progress and pre- 
sent state of the Water-works at Fair Mount," some years ago, but which 
has not yet been published. His familiarity with the subject in general, 
and with those works in particular, would make the history highly inter- 
esting to the present generation, and a source of valuable information to 
future ones. See Journal of the Franklin Institute, vol. iii, first series ; 
which contains a plan and section of one of the wheels and one of the 
pumps. 

a What a contrast with the old works at London bridge, where one wheel worked six- 
teen small pumps ; the friction of the numerous pistons and the apparatus for moving 
them consuming a great portion of the power employed. 



302 Fire Engines. [Book III, 



CHAPTER VII. 

Fire-engines : Probably used in Babylon and Tyre — Employed by ancient warriors — Other devices of 
theirs — Fire-engines referred to by Apollodorus — These probably equal in effect to ours : Spiritalia of 
Heron : Fire-engine described in it — Pumps used to promote conflagrations — Greek fire, a liquid pro- 
jected by pumps — Fires and wars commonly united — Generals, the greatest incendiaries — Saying of 
Crates respecting them — Fire pumps the forerunners of guns — Use of engines in Rome — Mentioned in a 
letter of Pliny to Trajan, and by Seneca, Hesychius and Isidore. Roman firemen — Frequency of fires 
noticed by Juvenal — Detestable practice of Crassus — Portable engines in Roman houses — flio<Iern en- 
gines derived from the Spiritalia — Forgotten in the middle ages — Superstitions with regard to fires — Fires 
attributed to demons — Consecrated bells employed as substitutes for water and fire-engines — Extracts 
from the Paris Ritual, Wynken de Worde, Barnaby Googe and Peter Martyr respecting them — Emble- 
matic device of an old duke of Milan — Firemen's apparatus from Agricola — Syringes used in London to 
quench fires in the 17th century — Still employed in Constantinople — Anecdote of the Capudan Pacha — 
Syringe engine from Besson — German engines of the 16th century — Pump engine from Decaus — Pump 
engines in London — Extracts from the minutes of the London Common Council respecting engines and 
squirts in 1667— Experiment of Maurice mentioned by Stow the historian— Extract from ' a history of the 
first inventors.' 

Of the machines described in the 1st and 2d books some are employed 
in raising water for the irrigation of land, and for numerous purposes of 
rural and domestic economy ; others in various operations of engineering 
and the arts, but with the exception of the centrifugal pumps, (Nos. 95, 6, 
and 7,) the liquid falls inertly from them all — i. e. it is not forcibly ejected 
as from a forcing pump or syringe : whether it be poured from a bucket, 
drawn from a gutter, escape from a noria, or from the orifice of a screw, 
or the spout of an atmospheric pump, it flows from each by the influence 
of gravity and consequently descends as it flows — such machines are there- 
fore inapplicable for projecting water on fires, because for this purpose the 
liquid is required to ascend after leaving the apertures of discharge and with 
a velocity sufficient to carry it high into the air ; and also when conveyed 
to a distance through flexible or other tubes, to be delivered from them at 
elevations far above the machine itself. As these effects are produced by 
the pumps described in the present division of the subject, most of them 
have at different times been adopted as fire-engines; some account of these 
important machines may therefore be inserted here. 

Water is the grand agent that nature has provided for the extinguish- 
ment of flames, and contrivances for applying it with effect have, in every 
civilized country, been assiduously sought for. In the absence of more 
suitable implements, buckets and other portable vessels of capacity, at hand, 
have always been seized to convey and throw water on fires; and when 
used with celerity and presence of mind at the commencement of one have 
often been sufficient; but when a conflagration extends beyond their reach, 
the fate of the burning pile too often resembles that of the ships of Eneas: 

Nor buckets poured, nor strength of human hand 
Can the victorious element withstand. Eneid, v. 

The necessity of some device by which a stream of water might be forced 
from a distance on flames must have been early perceived, and if we were 
to judge from the frequency and extent of ancient conflagrations, the pro- 
digious amount of property destroyed, and of human misery induced by 
them, we should conclude that ingenious men of former times were stimu- 
lated in an unusual degree to invent machines for the purpose. That this 
was the case cannot well be questioned, although no account of their la- 



Chap. 7.1 Fire-engines employed in Ancient Wars. 303 

bors has reached our times. It seems exceedingly probable that some 
kind of fire-engines were used in the celebrated cities of remote antiquity 
• — i n Nineveh, Tyre, Babylon and others. It is scarcely possible that the 
Tyrian and Babylonian mechanicians, whose inventive talents and skill 
were proverbial, should have left their splendid cities destitute of such 
means for preserving them from the ravages of fire. If the great extent 
of Babylon, for example, be considered, its location, (on an extensive plain,) 
the length of its streets, (fifteen miles,) the height of its buildings, (three 
and four stories,) and its unrivaled wealth, together with the heat and 
dryness of the climate ; the necessity of such machines will be apparent, 
and what appears necessary to us, we may rest assured, appeared equally 
so to its mechanicians, and that they were quite as capable of providing 
by their ingenuity for the emergency. Nor are we left wholly to conjec- 
ture respecting their knowledge of hydraulic or pneumatic machinery, 
since the most memorable machine for raising - water in the ancient world 
was made and used at Babylon, and one which, as has been elsewhere 
observed, greatly exceeded in the elevation to which it raised it, all, or 
nearly all the water-works of modern days. Had they engines like ours 
then 1 We dare not say they had, although we see nothing improbable 
in the opinion : the antiquity of the syringe is unquestionable ; and its ap- 
plication to project water on flames must have been as obvious in remote 
as in present times ; and people would as naturally be led then as now, 
to construct large ones for that purpose. 

There are other reasons for believing that syringes or pumps for squirt- 
ing water on fires were in use previous to the time they are first mention- 
ed in history. Fire was one of the most common and most destructive 
agents employed in ancient wars. When a city was besieged or assaulted, 
it was the first object with the assailants to protect the moving towers, in 
which their battering engines, &c. approached the walls, from being con- 
sumed by fire, oil and pitch, &c. thrown upon them from the ramparts. 
Every source was examined that ingenuity could unfold, for materials and 
devices to protect them; and as not only the lives and property of the in- 
habitants, but often the destinies of armies and even of nations were on 
such occasions at stake, it is reasonable to conclude that the most perfect 
apparatus which could then be procured, were employed both for destroy- 
ing buildings by fire, and also for preserving them from it. We know 
that men were specially trained to fire buildings, and that they were ex- 
pert in their profession, especially in shooting lighted arrows and darts 
into and upon structures that could not be approached ; hence the neces- 
sity of devices for throwing water upon these missiles and the places in- 
flamed by them. There is an allusion to both practices in the Epistle to 
the Ephesians, vi, 16. Such a system of warfare could never have been 
carried to the extent that it was, and for so many ages too, among the cele- 
brated nations of old, without forcing pumps or something like them being 
used to squirt water on such parts as could not be reached by it when 
thrown from the hand. We cannot conceive how the constant repetition 
of one army applying its energies to the destruction of another by means 
of fire, and the latter equally intent on devising and applying means to 
extinguish it, without the application of the syringe and of machines on the 
principle of the bellows occurring to them — an application so obvious 
(even then) that the slightest mental effort to produce a contrivance for 
the purpose could not have overlooked it, even if the occasions were of 
little moment, much less, when the inventive powers of armies, and of 
military engineers in particular, were engaged in the research, and the fate 
of nations depended upon the result. From a remark in one of Pliny's 



304 Fire Engines mentioned by Apollodorus. [Book III. 

letters, to which we shall presently refer, it appears that among the Romans 
individuals were brought up to the profession of extinguishing fires. 

The Helepolcs, or ' town takers' of Demetrius, although proofs of his me- 
chanical genius, would have availed him little at the siege of Rhodes, nor 
the movable towers of Hannibal at Saguntum, if these warriors had not 
been in possession of means to prevent them from being consumed by the 
fire of the besieged — of materials to resist its effects, and apparatus to ex- 
tinguish it. That the resources of the ancients in these respects were not 
inferior to ours, may be inferred from several historical facts respecting 
their modes of securing these towers. They were generally covered with 
raw hides, leather soaked in water, or cloth made of hair, and sometimes, 
although seldom, they were plated with metal. Such were some of those 
employed by Titus at the siege of Jerusalem. They were seventy-five 
feet high and were covered all over with sheets of iron ; perhaps nothing 
else could have resisted the incessant torrents of fire which the infuriated 
Jews showered upon them. But a singular proof of the sagacity and re- 
searches of the ancients is, that the modern application of alum to render 
wood incombustible was also known ; for Archelaus, one of the generals 
of Mithridates in a war with the Romans, washed over a wooden tower 
with a solution of it and thereby defeated all the attempts of Sylla to set 
the structure on fire. Thus we see that when mechanical means failed 
them, or were not at hand, they had recourse to chemical ones. But that 
water and machines for dispersing it, were extensively employed on such 
occasions appears from a remark of Vitruvius. He observes that the lower 
stories of the towers contained large quantities of water for the purpose 
of extinguishing fire thrown upon them. Of course they had means of 
projecting it wherever required, but of these unfortunately he is silent. 
Montfaucon has engraved a figure of a species of wheel for the purpose, 
but its representation is too imperfect to indicate the nature of the ma- 
chine of which it seems to have formed a part. 

That machines of the pu?np kind were used on these occasions is evi- 
dent from the temporary contrivance of Apollodorus, mentioned in the re- 
mains of a work of his On War Machines, and quoted by Professor Beck- 
man. We have noticed, at page 235, one of his plans for extinguishing 
fire in the upper parts of a building, and that to which we now refer is 
from the same passage. Water, he observes, may be conveyed to elevated 
places when exposed to jiery darts, by means of the entrails of an ox : 
these natural tubes being connected to a bag filled with water ; by com- 
pressing the bag the liquid will be forced through them to its place of 
destination. This device, he says, may be adopted when the "macliine 
called sipho is not at hand. Now if we had not known that the term 
sipho was anciently used to designate syringes and other tubular instru- 
ments, the substitute which Apollodorus here proposes sufficiently proves 
that it was a forcing pump to which he refers, and one too that, like our 
fire-engines, was furnished with leathern hose through which the water 
was conveyed to the " elevated places" he mentions. The importance of 
flexible pipes accompanying the pump or sipho, when employed in war, 
is obvious ; for one of the objects of those who threw " fiery darts" on the 
towers and other structures, was to fire them, if possible, at places inac- 
cessible to water for the most difficult to be reached — hence the necessity 
not only of engines, to project streams of that liquid, but also of such tubes 
to direct it to the places inflamed : and hence the suggestion of the tubes 
mentioned by Apollodorus when artificial ones were not to be procured : 
an ox was always within the reach of an army. 

As these engines would of course be similar to such as were used to 



Chap. 7.] 



Fire-Engine described by Heron. 



206 



extinguish fires in cities in times of peace, it is to be regretted that neither 
Apollodorus nor Vitruvius has described them : perhaps they were too 
common to have been thought worthy of particular notice. In the design 
and execution of their essential parts, they were probably equal to our best 
engines. Some persons may doubt this, but it should be remembered that 
the nature of ancient wars naturally led to the best construction of all mi- 
litary machinery ; and of defensive apparatus, engines to extinguish fire 
could not have been the least important, when that element was univer- 
sally employed. The contests of the ancients were often those of mecha- 
nical skill rather than of fighting — conflicts of talent in engineering than 
in generalship ; hence the ingenuity displayed in their machinery and the 
wonders wrought by it. Archimedes, by superior machines, protected 
Syracuse for eight months against all the efforts of the legions of Marcellus 
and the Roman engineers. The successes of Demetrius and Hannibal 
were often due to the novelty of their engines : the Carthagenian machin- 
ists were indeed proverbially skilful, so much so, that in Rome itself any 
curious piece of mechanism was, by way of eminence, named punic. An- 
cient armies were also often employed in obtaining, raising and cutting off 
water ; the hydraulic engines of Ganymede nearly ruined Csesar and his 
army in Alexandria, Cyrus took Babylon by diverting the course of the 
Euphrates, &c. The frequent use of hydraulic engines in war either to 
extinguish fires or for other purposes, would naturally lead to skill in mak- 
ing as well as in using them. 




No. 141. Egyptian Fire-Engine of the 2d century before Christ, from Heron's Spiritalia. 

That the idea of employing forcing pumps as fire-engines was not new 
in the time of Apollodorus or Vitruvius, we have conclusive evidence. 
Among the small number of ancient writings that escaped destruction in 
those dark and turbulent ages that intervened between the decline of the 
Roman power and the introduction of printing into Europe, was a Greek 
manuscript, containing an account of various devices for the application of 
water, and among them an engine for extinguishing fires. This small 
work was illustrated with figures, like the original work of Vitruvius. 
Several Latin translations were made and published in the 16th and 17th 

39 



306 Fire-Engine described by Heron. [Book III. 

centuries, and most of them were ornamented with copies of the original 
illustrations. This was the Spiritalia of Heron, to which we have already 
referred, (page 270.) As the engine may interest some readers, a figure 
of it is annexed. See No. 141 on the preceding page. 

To persons not familiar with hydraulic machinery this figure will ap- 
pear a rude and imperfect affair; but notwithstanding its antiquity and the 
mutilations which it has unquestionably sustained in passing through the 
hands of copyists, it exhibits nearly all the essential elements of a modern 
engine. Like the machine of Ctesibius, Heron's engine consists of two 
brass forcing pumps connected to one discharging pipe. The cylinders 
are secured to a base of wood and are partly immersed in water ; they 
are described in the text as turned or bored very smooth, with pistons ac- 
curately fitted to work in them. The piston rods are attached by bolts to 
a double lever at equal distances from the centre or fulcrum at A. The 
qarriage not being necessary to elucidate the principle of the machine was 
omitted by Heron. The rectangular figure into which the upper part of 
the discharging pipe is formed, has certainly been added by some trans- 
criber of the manuscript. Neither Heron nor his contemporaries could 
have made such an obstacle to the issuing fluid, and nothing of the kind 
is mentioned in the text. There is, moreover, conclusive evidence that 
the figure has been altered; for example, there is no provision represented 
by which the direction of the perpendicular jet can be changed, and hence 
an engine made according to it, would, on this account alone, be useless ; 
now Heron not only describes a movable tube, fitted by a joint (goose 
neck) to the perpendicular one, by turning of which the water could be 
discharged on any given place, but he refers his readers to the figure of 
it in the illustration. 

Had Heron's machine an air chamber ? This is an interesting question, 
since if it were determined in the affirmative, there would be little left 
for the moderns to claim in fire-engines except details in the construction 
of the carriages and other matters of minor importance, that have been 
left unnoticed in the Spiritalia. The accounts of machines by ancient au- 
thors are generally very concise ; they did not think it necessary to enter 
into that minutiae of narration that characterizes the specifications of modern 
patents, nor would it have been of much use to us if they had, but the 
contrary, for the multiplicity of mere technical terms would rather have 
increased than removed our embarrassments. This is evident from the 
variety of explanations given of a few such terms that Vitruvius employs 
in describing some of the inventions of Ctesibius and other mechanicians : 
hence in all the accounts of ancient machinery, it was of more importance 
to preserve the figures or illustrations than the text from corruption. 

The description of Heron's engine which the text and the figure afford, 
is, to persons conversant with such machines, sufficiently explicit, with the 
exception of that part of both which relates to the discharging pipe and 
apparatus connected to it — or in other words, to the air vessel, for that 
there was one, we think every intelligent reader will presently admit. 
Had the figure been always exactly copied by the multipliers of manu- 
scripts, of course no obscurity would here have been felt, but even in the 
state in which it has reached us, an air vessel is certainly portrayed. It 
may be asked, If this be so, why was it not discovered before 1 Possibly 
because no one sought particularly for it : its diminutive size and general 
resemblance to a plain tube would prevent any one else from recognizing 
it. It will be seen in the figure that one part of the discharging pipe 
descends into an enlarged portion of that below it, and that a space is left 
between them; thus constituting an air chamber, and precisely of the same 



Chap. 7.] Greek Fire projected by Pumps. 307 

plan as those generally used in engines at this day. This part of the figure 
(and this alone) in Commandine's translation of the Spiritalia is not shown 
' in section, but the arrangement of the pipes is precisely as shown in the cut. 
Now this addition to the discharging pipe could not have been made in 
the 16th century, when the work fell into the hands of printers and en- 
gravers, for at that time the use of it was not known, while from the small 
dimensions figured it could have been of no service. That it originated 
with Heron and formed a prominent feature in the original figure, is evi- 
dent from the text : when speaking of the escape of the water from this 
part of the machine, he expressly states that it was forced out, in the same 
manner as out of a vase or fountain, which he had previously described, 
by means of compressed air — 'per aerem in ipso compressum.' 3 - Nothing 
can be plainer than this ; for every manufacturer of pumps knows that in 
the absence of an air vessel there could have been no air to compress. 

It is an interesting circumstance in the history of this ancient engine 
that the air vessel should have been preserved through so many ages when 
its use was not known. While its size was diminished its form was re- 
tained. It is no wonder that the old copyists considered it an unsightly 
and unnecessary enlargement of the discharging pipe, and hence they re- 
duced it accordingly — certainly the fancy that could add the rectangular 
twist to the upper part, would not hesitate to remove the supposed defor- 
mity from the lower one. Some persons, deceived by the imperfect re- 
presentation, have supposed that such engines were not used in the time 
of Heron, and that the figure and description were inserted in his work as 
mere hints for future mechanicians to improve on ; but the description 
sufficiently indicates that similar machines were in actual use. b The ma- 
terials and workmanship of the pumps — metallic pistons and spindle valves, 
with guards to prevent the latter from opening too far ; the mode of form- 
ing the goose-neck by a kind of swivel joint, somewhat like the union or 
coupling screw ; the application of an air vessel ; two pumps forcing water 
through one pipe, and both worked by a double lever, are proofs that the 
machine described by Heron was neither an ideal one, nor of recent 
origin or use. There are features in it that were very slowly developed 
by manufacturers in modern times. It is not at all improbable that an- 
cient engines were equal in effect to the best of ours ; but, whether they 
were or not, one thing is certain, that to the ancients belongs the merit of 
discovering the principles employed in these machines and of applying 
them to practice. It is remarkable too, that fire engines made their first 
appearance in Egypt, thus adding another to the numerous obligations 
under which that wonderful country has placed civilized nations in all 
times to come. 

Having noticed the use of pumps to extinguish fires in ancient warfare, 
we may remark that they were also employed in the middle ages, if not 
before, to promote conflagrations, viz: to lanch streams of Greek fire. This 
mysterious substance is represented as a liquid : Beckman says it cer- 
tainly was one ; and so far from being quenched, its violence was aug- 
mented by contact with water. It was principally employed in naval 
combats, being enclosed in jars that were thrown into the hostile vessels. 
It was also blown through iron and copper tubes planted on the prows of 
galleys and fancifully shaped like the mouths of animals, which seemed to 
vomit streams of liquid fire. There is among the figures of war machines 
in the old German translation of Vegetius already mentioned, one that 

a Spiritalia, p. 7 \ 

b Siphones autem quibus utuntur ad incendia hoc modo construuntur. — Ibid. 



3 OS Warriors the greatest Incendiaries. [Book III. 

(judging from the flames issuing from monstrous animals' mouths) seems to 
have been designed for projecting Greek fire, though it is difficult to per- 
ceive how it was done. Another mode of using this terrible material, 
was by forcing it in jets " by means of large fire-engines," and sometimes 
" the soldiers squirted it from hand engines." Its effects upon those on 
whom it was thrown, seem to have been somewhat similar to those pro- 
duced by the composition of alcohol and spirits of turpentine recently adopt- 
ed as a substitute for oil in lamps, and which has occasioned so many fatal 
disasters, by the explosion of vessels containing it and its consequent dis- 
persion over the persons of the sufferers. It was easy (says Beckman) to 
conceive the iaea of discharging Greek fire by means of forcing pumps, 
because the application of them to extinguish fires was known long before 
its invention. It is supposed to have originated with Callinicus, a Syrian 
engineer of Balbec, in the 7th century. It may however have been known 
to the old Greeks and Romans, for they made use of similar devices for 
projecting fire : Montfaucon, in describing their marine combats, observes 
" another mode of annoying enemies' ships was by throwing fire therein, 
which they did after different ways, some using for that purpose sipliones, 
and fire buckets, others threw in pots filled with fire." From an expres- 
sion of Dr. G. A. Agricola, a physician of Ratisbon of the last century, in 
a work on Gardening, (see page 127 in Bradley's translation) it would ap- 
pear as if something like the Greek fire was then in use. Enumerating 
several pernicious inventions, he notices " That infernal one of gunpowder. 
How many cities and fortresses has it ruined '\ How many thousands of 
men has it destroyed ] And what is most deplorable is, that this art grows 
more and more complete every day, and is brought to that perfection, that 
in Holland and some other parts they have fire pumps filled with burning 
compositions, wherewith they eject fiery torrents to a great distance, 
which may occasion dreadful and irreparable damages to mankind." 

Fires and wars have ever been deemed the most awful of earthly cala- 
mities, and, unfortunately for our race, they have too often been united, 
for warriors have generally had recourse to the former to multiply the mi- 
series of the latter ; and in almost every age cities have, like Jericho and 
Ai, Hebron and Ziglag, Troy and Thebes, Carthage and Athens, Sagun- 
tum and Bagdat, been burnt with fire ; and in some cases " all the souls 
therein destroyed" — "cities burned without inhabitants." It was, we be 
lieve, from the horrible, the inconceivable sufferings endured on such oc- 
casions, that much of the thrilling imagery of the Bible was derived. To 
the offending Jews, God was represented as "a consuming fire," and they 
were urged to repentance " lest his fury come forth like fire, and burn, 
that none can quench it — lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph 
and there be none to quench it in Bethel ;" and some of the sublimest ef- 
fusions of the prophets have reference to " firebrands, arrows and death" 
— to " blood and fire and pillars of smoke." In modern times, too, war- 
riors have been the greatest incendiaries : hamlets, towns and cities have 
been wantonly consumed, and the " gallant" actors have made the air 
shiver with their shouts of acclamation on witnessing the spreading con- 
flagration. Well did the ancients represent Mars fierce in aspect, bran- 
dishing a spear, arid driving in his chariot o'er mangled corses, amid the 
clangor of arms and the shrieks of the dying — Fear, Terror and Discord 
in his train, while before went Bellona, with her hair loose and clotted 
with gore, and a firebrand in her hand. And these are the demons that 
men professing Christianity worship with all the fervor of deluded hea- 
then ; and, what will in future times appear incredible, they demand re- 
verence for the act, and they — receive it ! Strange, that notwithstanding 



Chap. 7.] Roman Firemen. 309 

the boasted superiority of the age and the benign spirit and precepts of 
religion — the profession of war — the most prolific source of human misery 
and crime, is still deemed honorable ; and men under whose tyranny na- 
tions and provinces groan, and by whom human life is extinguished not 
only without remorse but with indifference, are permitted to take prece- 
dence in moral society. Crates was certainly correct when he intimated 
that wars would never cease till men became convinced of the folly and 
wickedness of allowing themselves to be driven as soldiers like sheep to 
the slaughter, or like wolves to devour each other — but as he expressed 
it, not till men become sensible that generals are only ass drivers. 

As Greek fire preceded gunpowder in Europe, so pumps or the ' spout- 
ing engines' for projecting it may be considered the forerunners of guns: 
it is even possible that the first idea of the latter (supposing they were not 
introduced from the east) might have been derived from accidental explo- 
sions of the liquid in the pump cylinders, when the pistons would of course 
be driven out of them like balls out of cannon. But be this as it may, 
enough has been adduced to show that the forcing pump and its modifica- 
tions have exerted no small degree of influence in ancient wars and con- 
sequently in the affairs of the old world. 

Although the police and other arrangements for the actual suppression 
of fires in ancient Rome are not well ascertained, some interesting particu- 
lars are known. A body of firemen, named matricularii, was established 
whose duty it was to extinguish the flames. Similar companies were also 
organized in provincial cities. This appears from Trajan's reply to Pliny 
respecting the formation of one in Nicomedia, and from which we learn 
that these ancient firemen frequently created disturbances by their dissen- 
tions and tumults. Pliny (the younger) was governor of Bithynia ; after 
giving the emperor an account of a fire in Nicomedia, a town in his pro- 
vince, he continues, " You will consider, sir, whether it may not be ad- 
visable to form a company of firemen, consisting only of one hundred and 
fifty members. I will take care none but those of that business shall be 
admitted into it ; and that the privileges granted them shall not be ex- 
tended to any other purpose. As this corporate body will be .restricted 
to so small a number of members, it will be easy to keep them under 
proper regulations." In answer the emperor sent the following letter : 
" Trajan to Pliny. — You are of opinion it would be proper to establish 
a company of firemen in Nicomedia, agreeably to what has been prac- 
ticed in several other cities. But it is to be remembered that societies of this 
sort have greatly disturbed the peace of the province in general, and of 
those cities in particular. Whatever name we give them, and for what- 
ever purpose they may be instituted, they will not fail to form themselves 
into factious assemblies, however short their meetings may be. It will 
therefore be safer to provide such machines as are of service in extin- 
guishing fires, enjoining the owners of houses to assist in preventing the 
mischief from spreading, and, if it should be necessary, to call in the aid 
of the populace." Pliny's Letters, B. x. Ep. 42 and 43. Melmoth's 
Translation. 

The direction to procure " machines as are of service in extinguishing 
fires" was in consequence of Nicomedia being destitute of them — an un- 
fortunate circumstance for the inhabitants, but one that is hardly now re- 
gretted by those who are in search of information respecting fire-engines 
among the ancients ; since it led Pliny to mention them, and thereby af- 
ford us a proof of their employment by the Romans. " While I was mak- 
ing a progress [he writes to Trajan] in a different part of the province, a 
most destructive fire broke out in Nicomedia, which not only consumed 



310 Fire-Engines and Fires in Ancient Rome. [Book III 

several private houses, but also two public buildings, the town house and 
the temple of Isis, though they stood on contrary sides of the street. The 
occasion of its spreading thus wide was partly owing to the violence ot 
the wind, and partly to the indolence of the people, who, it appears, stood 
fixed and idle spectators of this terrible calamity. The truth is, the city 
was not furnished with either engines, buckets, or any single instrument 
proper to extinguish fires ; which I have now however given directions 
to be provided." It has been generally imagined [observes Melmoth] 
that the ancients had not the art of raising water by engines, but this pas- 
sage seems to favor the contrary opinion. The word in the original 
[for engine] is sipho, which Hesychius explains instrumentum ad, jaculan- 
dus aquas adversus incendia — an instrument to throw up water against 
fires. But there is a passage in Seneca which seems to put the matter 
beyond conjecture, though none of the critics upon this place have taken 
notice of it. Solemus (says he) duabus manibus inter se junctus aquam 
concipere et compressa utrinque palma in modum siphonis exprimere. Q. 
N. ii, 16, where we plainly see the use of this sipho was to throw up 
water. In the French translation of De Sacy, (Paris 1809,) the word is 
rendered pumps : — " D'ailleurs, il n'y a dans la ville, ni pompes ni seaux 
publics, enfin nul autre des instrumens necessaires pour eteindre les em- 
brasemens." And Professor Beckman quotes both Hesychius and Isidore 
to prove that " a fire-engine, properly so called, was understood in the 4th 
and in the 7th centuries by the term sipfio," and we may add that Agri- 
cola in the 16th century designated syringes for extinguishing fires by the 
same term. Heron's engine is also named a siphon. See note p. 307. 

From an expression in the letter of Pliny just quoted, we learn that 
men were regularly brought up to the art of extinguishing fires, the same 
as to any other profession : Of the company that he proposed to estab- 
lish, he remarks, " I will take care that none but those of that business 
shall be admitted into it." The buildings in ancient Rome were very 
high, the upper stories were mostly of wood, and the streets and lanes 
were extremely narrow, hence the suppression of conflagrations there 
must have been an arduous business, and one that required extraordinary 
intrepidity and skill ; qualifications that could only be obtained by expe- 
rience. Besides engines for throwing water, the firemen used sponges or 
mops fixed to the end of long poles, and they had grapples and other 
instruments by means of which they could go from one wall to another, 
(Encyc. Antiq.) Of the great elevation of the houses several Roman 
writers speak. Seneca attributed the difficulty of extinguishing fires to 
this cause. Juvenal mentions 

Roofs that make one giddy to look down. Sat. vi. 

When the city was rebuilt after the great conflagration, (supposed to 
have been induced by Nero,) the height of the houses was fixed at about 
seventy feet. These were raised to a certain height without wood, being 
arched with stone, and party walls were not allowed. That fires were 
constantly occurring in old Rome is well known. Juvenal repeatedly 
mentions the fact : Thus in his third satire : — 



And again : 



Rome, where one hears the everlasting sound 
Of beams and rafters thundering to the ground, 
Amid alarms by day and fears by night. 

But lo ! the flames bring yonder mansion down ! 
The dire disaster echoes through the town ; 
Men look as if for solemn funeral clad, 
Now, now indeed these 7iightly fires are sad. 



Chap. 7.] Portable Engines in Roman Houses. 311 

Their frequency induced Augustus to institute a body of watchmen to 
guard against them, and, from the following lines of Juvenal, it appears 
'that wealthy patricians had servants to watch their houses during the night: 

With buckets ranged the ready servants stand, 
Alert at midnight by their lords' command. Sat. xiv. 

As every calamity that befalls mankind is converted by some men to 
their own advantage, so the numerous fires in Rome led to the detestable 
practice of speculating on the distresses they occasioned. Thus Crassus, 
the consul, who, from his opulence was surnamed the Rich, gleaned his 
immense wealth, according to Plutarch " from war and from, jires ; he 
made it a part of his business to buy houses that were on fire, and others 
that joined upon them, which he commonly got at a low price on account 
of the fear and distress of the owners about the event." But the avarice 
of Crassus, as is the case with thousands of other men, led to his ruin. 
With the hope of enlarging his possessions, he selected the province of 
Syria for his government, or rather for his extortion, because it seemed to 
promise him an inexhaustible source of wealth : but by a retributive Provi- 
dence his army was overthrown by the Parthians, whom he attempted to 
subdue, and who cut off his head, and in reference to his passion for gold 
fused a quantity of that metal and poured it down his throat. 

Among other precautions for preventing fires from spreading that were 
adopted in Rome on rebuilding the city, was one requiring every citizen 
to keep in his house " a machine for extinguishing fire." What these ma- 
chines were is not quite certain, whether buckets, mops, hooks, syringes 
or portable pumps. That they were the last is supposed to be proved 
by a passage in the writings of Ulpian, a celebrated lawyer and secretary 
to the Emperor Alexander Severus, wherein he enumerates the things 
that belonged to a house when it was sold, such as we name fixtures, 
and among them he mentions siphones employed in extinguishing fires. 
Beckman thinks the leaden pipes which conveyed water into the houses 
for domestic purposes might be intended ; but they would hardly have 
been designated as above, merely because the water conveyed through 
them was occasionally used to put out fires. This was not their chief use, 
but an incidental one. That they were pumps or real fire-engines was 
the opinion of Alexander ab Alexandro, a learned lawyer of the 15th 
century ; an opinion not only rendered probable by the terms used and 
the necessity of such implements for the security of the upper stories, 
which neither public engines nor streams from the aqueducts could reach, 
but also from the apparent fact, that syringes or portable pumps have al- 
ways been kept (to a greater or less extent) in dwellings from Roman 
times. And a sufficient reason why they should generally be sold with 
the houses, might be found in their dimensions being regulated according 
to those of the buildings for which they were designed. 

The population of Rome was so great that the area of the city could 
not furnish sites sufficient for the houses ; and hence (as Vitruvius has ob- 
served, B. ii, cap. 8) the height of the walls was increased in order to 
multiply the number of stories — ' for want of room on the earth the build- 
ings were extended towards the heavens.' Portable fire-engines were 
therefore particularly requisite, in order promptly to extinguish fires on 
their first appearance, whether in the upper or lower floors. In the latter 
case, when this was not done, the people in the higher stories would be 
cut off from relief and the means of escape. Were some of our six and 
seven story buildings in the narrow streets, densely filled with human 
beings, and a raging fire suddenly to burst out on the ground floors, the 



312 Fire- Engines forgotten in the Middle Ages. [Book III. 

probability is that many lives would be lost, notwithstanding the great 
number of our public engines, and hose and ladder companies. Juvenal 
intimates the distressed situation of those dwelling above under such 
circumstances. 

Hark ! where Ucalegon for water cries 

Casts out his chattels, from the peril flies, 

Dense smoke is bursting from the floor below. Sat. iii. 

However perfect or imperfect hydraulic and hydro-pneumatic engines 
in ancient Alexandria and Rome may have been, it is certain that these 
machines and the arts related to them experienced the withering influ- 
ence of that moral and mental desolation which raged throughout Europe 
during the dark ages. The decline of learning was necessarily accom- 
panied with a corresponding decay in all the useful and ornamental arts : 
some of these have disappeared altogether, and have never been recover- 
ed, so that the attainments of the ancients in them have perished. But the 
connection between literature and the arts was as apparent in their resto- 
ration as in their declension — if they departed together they also returned 
in company. The revival of learning not only led to the introduction of 
printing and the invention of the press, but it furnished, in the multiplica- 
tion of ancient manuscripts, then extant, immediate employment for both ; 
and although it may be supposed that there can be little or no relation be 
tween Greek or Latin manuscripts and modern fire-engines, yet there 
really is an intimate one, for it is all but certain that the first idea of these 
machines as now made, was derived from Heron's Spiritalia ; just as the 
application of double and treble forcing pumps in modern water-works, 
was from Vitruvius' treatise on architecture. The printing press, there- 
fore, not only opened the literary treasures of the ancients to the world 
at large, which had previously been confined to a few, but at the samp 
time it made us acquainted with some of their machinery and their arts, 
that had long been forgotten or lost sight of. 

Fire-engines were nearly or altogether forgotten in the middle ages : 
portable syringes seem to have been the only contrivances, except buckets, 
for throwing water on fires, and from their inefficiency and other causes, 
their employment was very limited. The general ignorance which then 
pervaded Europe not only prevented the establishment of manufactories 
of better instruments; but the superstitions of the times actually discouraged 
their use. There is not a more singular fact (and it is an incontrovertible 
one) in the history of the human mind, than that the religious doctrines 
and opinions of a large portion of mankind should have in every age 
produced the most deplorable results with regard to conflagrations. The 
Parsees, Ghebres, &c. of Asia, and other religious sects, which have sub- 
sisted from the remotest ages, never willingly throw water upon fires — 
they consider it criminal to quench it, no matter how disastrous the result 
may be : they had rather perish in it than thus extinguish the emblem of the 
Deity they worship. " They would sooner be persuaded to pour on oyl 
to increase, than water to assuage the flame. " a Among such people fire- 
engines of course were never used. Another and a larger part of the 
human race though they entertain no such reverence for fire, are so 
far influenced by the pernicious doctrine of Fatalism, as to make little or 
no efforts to suppress it. They look upon fires as the act of God ! deter- 
mined by him ! and therefore conclude it useless to contend with him, in 
attempting to extinguish those which He has kindled ! Hence the pro- 
verbial indifference of Mahommedans in the midst of conflagrations. What 



Ovington's Voyages 10 Surat in 1689, page 372. 



Chap. 7.] Bells used as Substitutes for Fire-engines. 313 

Toreen has said of Surat in particular, is applicable to every city of Asia 
and of the East. " Many fine buildings have been destroyed by fire, 
which, according to the Mahommedan doctrine of predestination, it is in 
vain to withstand." Of the Chinese, by far the shrewdest of Asiatics, Mr. 
Davis remarks, " The foolish notion of fatalism which prevails among the 
people, makes them singularly careless as regards fire ; and the frequent 
occurrence of accidents, has no effect upon them, although the fearful con- 
flagration of 1822, went far to destroy the whole city," (Canton.) 

The miserable delusions which ecclesiastics established in Europe during 
the middle ages were quite as preposterous, and equally effective in par- 
alizing the energies of the people. It is difficult to reflect on them without 
feeling emotions of wonder as well as pity, at the wretched condition of 
our race when void of knowledge ; and of gratitude, that in our times the 
shackles of ignorance and superstition are rapidly rusting away. It was 
a common belief that fires (and various other calamities) were induced by 
wicked spirits, and that the best mode of removing the evils was by driv- 
ing the authors of them away ! These intangible workers of mischief, 
according to the demonologists of the times, consisted of numerous classes, 
and the labors of each were confined to certain elements. It was those 
who roamed in the air that were the greatest incendiaries. " Aeriall 
spirits, or divells, are such as keep quarter most part in the aire [they] 
cause many tempests, thunder and lightnings, teare oakes,j£/-e steeples, 
houses''' &c. (See Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy.) When a house, 
therefore, was on fire, the priests, instead of stimulating by their exam- 
ple the bystanders to exert themselves in obtaining water, &c. had re- 
course to the images and pretended relics of saints, which they brought 
out of the churches, in order to exert their influence in stopping the pro- 
gress of the flames, and expelling the invisible authors of them. The pall, 
or sacred covering of the altar, was also frequently carried in procession, 
to contribute to the overthrow of the fiends. But when a church itself 
took fire, (such was the ignorance of the times,) the people then heartily 
blasphemed the saint to whom it was dedicated, for not preventing the 
mischief; (Encyc. Antiq.) like Sylla abusing the image of Apollo when 
he was defeated in battle. 

Other curious but popular substitutes for water and fire-engines, were 
church Bells: these were consecrated with imposing ceremonies. They were 
washed inside and out with holy water — perfumed with censers — anointed 
with sacred oil — named and signed with the cross, that devils (says the 
ritual) " hearing this bell may tremble and flee from the banner of the 
cross designed upon it." Besides striking demons with horror and driving 
them from the vicinity, these bells had the wonderful power of allaying 
storms, tempests, thunder and lightning, and extinguishing fires ; and 
some of them had the rare gift of ringing on important occasions of their 
own accord. a M. Arago, in a paper on Thunder and Lightning, inquires 
(among other alledged means of dissipating thunder clouds) into this old 
superstition of "Ringing of Bells;" and he cites specimens of prayers, 
still offered up, on their consecration, according to the Paris Ritual, " O 
eternal Grod ! grant that the sound of this Bell may put to flight the fire 
strokes of the enemy of man, the thunder bolt, the rapid fall of stones, as 
well as all disasters and tempests." In the "Golden Legend" of Wynken 
de Worde, the old English printer, it is said " the evil spirytes that ben 
in the region of th' ayre, doubte moche when they here the Belles ringen : 

R See a particular account of the ceremonies of consecrating bells as witnessed by the 
author of" Observations on a Journey to Naples." Lon. 1691. 

40 



3 1 4 Ancient Apparatus for Extinguishing Fires, [Book III. 

and this is the cause why the Belles ringen whan it thondreth, and whan 
grete tempeste and rages of wether happen, to the end that the feinds and 
wycked spirytes should ben abashed and flee, and cease of the movynge 
of tempeste." The following lines to the same effect, are from Barnaby 
Googe, an old British poet : 

If that the thunder chaunce to rore, 

And stormie tempestes shake, 
****** 
The clarke doth all the belles forthwith 

At once in steeple ring : 
With wondrous sound and deeper farre 

Than he was wont before, 
Till in the loftie heavens darke, 

The thunder bray no more, 
For in these christned belles they thinke 

Doth lie such powre and might 
As able is the tempeste great, 

And storme to vanquish quight. 

The application of bells to the purposes of fire-engines is also mentioned 
by Peter Martyr, in his " Common Places," a work dedicated to Queen 
Elizabeth. Black letter, 1583. Speaking of things consecrated by pa- 
pists in common with the ancient heathen, he says of bells — " they be 
washed, they be annointed, they be conjured, they are named and handled 
with far greater pomp and ambition, than men are when they are bap- 
tized, and more is attributed to them than to the prayers of godly men. 
For they say, that by the ringing of them — the wicked spirits, the host of 
adversaries, the laying await of enemies, tempestes, hayle, stormes, whirl- 
windes, violent blastes and hurtfull thunderclaps, are driven away, flames 
and fires are extinguished, and finally whatever else soever !" Part iv, 
cap. 9, p. 125. 

There is no small ringing of bells in this city (New- York) during fires; 
but their unaided effects on the devouring element, ere other means have 
arrived, has, we believe, been but small. Few have, however, been con- 
secrated ; but as from one to two hundred Spanish bells have recently 
been sold here, (having been taken from the convents in consequence of 
the civil war which has so long raged in that country,) this virtue of sacred 
bells may soon be tested. Certainly, if they can do a moiety of the good 
things mentioned above, they were worth much more than forty cents per 
lb. the average price at which they were sold. 

We have had recourse in a few instances to heraldry, or rather to the 
emblems or personal devices of ancient families, for information respecting 
machines, some of which are no longer in use ; as the eolipile, and the 
atmospheric sprinkling pot : see pages 261 and 396. Besides these the 
syringe and the bellows have also been adopted on such occasions; and it 
may be here observed that the device of Galeaz, duke of Milan, the second 
of the name, was a brand burning and two fire buckets. a This, although no 
proof that machines of the pump kind were not in use to extinguish fires 
in Italy during the 15th century, is an indication that none were employed 
at the time when the device was adopted. 

The oldest sketch of a complete set of apparatus for extinguishing fire 
that we have seen, is in a cut representing the interior of a laboratory or 
smelting furnace, in the De Re Metallica of Agricola, page 308. The 
implements are, a syringe, a sledge hammer, two fire hooks and three 
leathern buckets ; conveniently arranged against a wall. See the annexed 
illustration. These figures seem to have escaped the notice of Beckman 

a Devices Heroiques. A Lyon. 1577, page 50. 



Chap. 7.] 



From Agricola. 



315 



and subsequent authors, nor is this surprising since they form a very small" 
and obscure part of the original engraving. We noticed the latter several 
times before observing them. The syringe was made of brass ; it is de- 
signated 




ori- 
chalceus, cujus usus est in 
incendiis. In these figures 
we behold aU that was 
preserved through the 
middle ages of ancient 
firemen's machinery : the 
engine of Heron seems to 
have been quite forgotten. 
Indeed the syringe itself 
was not generally used in 
Europe till late, for it was 
not till the close of the 
16th century that "hand 
squirts," as they were 
named, were introduced 
into London. Previous to 
that time watchmen, buck- 
ets, hooks and ladders, on- 

No. 142. Firemen's Apparatus from Agricola. j y wepe j n uge> Cutting 

away with axes and throwing water from buckets are mentioned (observes 
Fosbroke) by Petronius and Grervase of Canterbury. The owners of 
houses or chimneys that took fire were fined; and men were appointed to 
watch for fires and give the alarm. In 1472 a night bellman was em- 
ployed in Exeter to alarm the inhabitants in case of fire, and in 1558, 
leathern buckets, ladders and crooks, were ordered to be provided for 
the same city ; no application of the pump seems to have been then 
thought of. 

Syringes continued to be used in London till the latter part of the 17th 
century, when they were superseded by more perfect machines. An ac- 
count of them and the mode of working them would make a modern fire- 
man smile. They were usually made of brass and held from two to four 
quarts. The smaller ones were about two feet and a half long, and an 
inch and a half in diameter ; the bore of the nozzles being half an inch. 
Three men were required to work each, which they achieved in this man- 
ner : two, one on each side, grasped the cylinder with one hand and the 
nozzle with the other ; while the third one worked the piston ! Those 
who held the instrument plunged the nozzle into a vessel of water, the 
operator then drew back the piston and thus charged the cylinder, and 
when it was raised by the bearers and in the required position, he pushed 
in the piston and forced, or rather endeavoured to force, the contents on 
the fire. We are told that some of these syringes are preserved in one 
or two of the parish churches. It can excite no surprise that London 
should have been almost wholly destroyed in the great fire of 1666, when 
such were the machines upon which the inhabitants chiefly depended for 
protecting their property and dwellings. If the diminutive size of these 
instruments be considered, the number of hands required to work each, 
beside others to carry water and vessels for them, the difficulty and often 
impossibility of approaching sufficiently near so as to reach the flames 
with the jet, the loss of part of the stream at the beginning and end of 
each stroke of the piston, and the trifling effect produced — the whole act 
of using them, appears rather as a farce, or the gambols of overgrow** 



316 Turkish Fire-Engines. [Book III. 

boys at play, than the well directed energies of men to subdue the raging 
element. 

In Asia syringes have probably been always in limited use. They are 
the only instruments of the pump kind now known there, if China be ex- 
cepted. Very effective engines on the European plan are made by the 
Chinese. (Chinese Repos. vol. iv.) 

The fire-engine of the Turks is an improvement on the syringe, but 
not much more effective. The author of " Sketches of Turkey" observes, 
when speaking of fires in Constantinople, " Indeed, when we afterwards 
saw the machines used by the Turks to extinguish fires, we were not sur- 
prised at the feeble resistance which they could oppose to the progress of 
the devouring element. The engines, in fact, are not larger than those 
employed with us to water gardens : they have but a single chamber, 
which is about eight inches long by three or four in diameter ; they are 
readily carried about by hand." Commodore Porter, in his interesting 
account of "Constantinople and its Environs," says their fire-engines "are 
like those we use in our gardens, for watering the beds and walks, and de- 
liver about as much water as a good large syringe. When an alarm of fire 
is given, a man seizes on one of these and runs to the spot indicated, with 
the engine on his shoulder, another brings a skin of water, pours it into 
the reservoir and they pump away." A characteristic anecdote is thus 
facetiously related by Commodore Porter. " They had heard of the fire- 
engines and fire companies of the United States — how half a shingle could 
be burnt, and the engines save the other half from the flames. They could 
not understand it. Mr. Eckford fortunately arrived with his beautiful 
ship, having one of our engines on board, requiring some twenty men to 
work it. The Capudan Pacha heard of it — ' Mash Allah ! let us see it,' 
exclaimed the old man. The engine was brought on shore and placed in 
the Navy Yard ; a short suction was fixed to it and put into the Bospho- 
rus; men were set to work it — the Navy Yard was soon inundated, and 
the Bosphorus began to run dry ! ' Mash Allah !' said he, ' very good 
— but it will require a sea to supply it with water. It won't do for us, 
for there is no sea in the middle of the city.' They therefore have thought 
best to stick to their squirts, and to let the fire spread until the wind 
changes, or it is tired of burning." 

Sandys, in the beginning of the 17th century, visited Constantinople, 
and speaks of the frequency of fires in that city : he observes, " It is not to 
be marvelled at, for the citizens dare not quench the fire that burnetii their 
own houses, because officers are appointed for that purpose." He is si- 
lent respecting the instruments then used. 

When the useful arts began to excite attention, the defects of portable 
syringes were too apparent to be neglected, hence in the early part of the 
16th century several attempts were made to remedy them, by those no- 
ble spirits who burst through the prejudice that had so long consigned 
the subjects of practical mechanics to the mere makers of machines, as one 
unworthy of a philosopher's pursuit; and from the cultivation of which 
no distinction, save such as was allied to that of a skilful artisan, could 
be derived — a species of fame from which professors of philosophy shrunk, 
like Plato, with feelings of horror. To render the syringe an efficient fire- 
engine, w r ould seem to be impossible, except by converting it into a forc- 
ing pump, and in that case it would be no longer a syringe. As long, 
therefore, as such an idea did not occur to engineers, they had no resource 
but to improve the " squirt" as well as they could ; and however hope- 
less the task may now appear, it was not only attempted, but to a certain 
extent accomplished, and with considerable ingenuity too, as will appear 



Chap. 7.] Syringe Engine from Besson. 317 

from the following figure, No. 143. It is described in Besson's " Thea- 
tre," and must therefore have been invented previous to 1568, the date of 
the permission to print his work. 




No. 143. Syringe Engine from Besson. A. D. 1568. 

" Proposition De U Autheur : — Artifice autant singulier (comme je 
" pense) que non point commun, pourjecter l'eau contre un grand feu, 
" mesraement lors que pour la grandeur de la flamme, nul ne peut entrer 
" ny approcher de la maison qui brusle. Declaration de la mesme figure : 
" Cest instrument, qui est faict en forme de Cone, se soustient sur deux 
" Roues : ayant sa bouche tournee vers le septentrion : et aupres de sa 
" base ii y a des demi cercles, 'qui servent a l'hausser," au baisser, d'avan- 
" tage vers sa dicte bouche septentrionale est un Entonnoir, pour y verser 
" l'eau dedans : et en sa base, ou bien partie meridionale, est une vis, dont 
" est pousse dedans et recule un Baston auquel sont des Estouppes, ainsi 
" qu'aux siringues. Le reste appert." 

In reading the above, it should be remembered that letters of reference 
to designate the different parts of machines were not then in general use, 
but the sides and angles of the pages were marked with various points of 
the compass ; and particular parts pointed out by their position with re- 
gard to these, and by the intersection of lines drawn between them. In 
this engine several defects of the " hand squirts" are avoided ; as the ne- 
cessity of inverting the instrument to refill it by plunging the nozzle into 
the vessel of water, the small quantity contained in the former, and the 
consequently incessant repetition of the operation and interruption of the 
jet, and the difficulty of directing it on the flames with certainty or preci- 
sion. Besson, (if he was the inventor,) therefore, greatly enlarged the 
capacity of the cylinder, making it sufficient to contain a barrel, or more ; 
and as a matter of necessity, placed it on a carriage. To eject the water 
uniformly, he moved the piston by a screw ; and when the cylinder was 
emptied, it was refilled through the funnel by an attendant, as the piston 
was drawn back by reversing the motion of the crank. When recharged, 
the stop cock in the pipe of the funnel was closed and the liquid forced 
out as before. As flexible pipes of leather, the " ball and socket" and 
" goose-neck" joints had not been introduced, some mode of changing 
the direction of the jet of this enormous syringe was necessary. To effect 
this, it is represented as suspended on pivots, which rest in two upright 
posts : to these are secured (see figure) two semicircular straps of iron, 
whose centres coincide with the axis, or pivots, on which the syringe 
turns. A number of holes are made in each, and are so arranged as to be 
opposite each other. A bolt is passed through two of these, and also 
through a similar hole, in a piece of metal, that is firmly secured to the 
upper part of the open end of the cylinder ; and thus holds the latter in 



318 Old German Engines. [Book III. 

any position required. The iron frame to which the box or female part 
of the screw is attached, is made fast to the cylinder ; and it is through a 
projecting' piece on the end of this frame that the bolt is passed. By 
these means, any elevation could be given to the nozzle, and the syringe 
could be secured by passing the bolt through the piece just mentioned, 
and through the corresponding holes in the straps. When a lateral change 
in the jet was required, the whole machine was moved by a man at the 
end of the pole, as in the figure. To the frame, jointed feet were attach- 
ed, which were let down when the engine was at work. The women 
represented (one only is given in our figure) reminds us of a remark by 
Fosbroke : " In the middle ages during fires women used to fetch water 
in brazen pails to assist." Considering the age when this engine was 
devised and the objects intended to be accomplished by it, it certainly 
has the merit of ingenuity as well as originality. Beroald says of it : 
" Ceste noble invention est si souvent requise, pour esteindre les grand 
feux desquels on ne peut approcher ; que sans faute elle merite d'estre 
plus au long, et plus ouvertement expliquee. afin qu'elle soit mieux en- 
tendue." It will be obvious to every practical mechanic that engines of 
this kind, of large dimensions, must have been at best but poor aifairs. To 
make the piston work sufficiently accurate and tight, and to keep it so, 
must have been a work of no small difficulty. 

A correspondent, in a late number of the Lon. Mechanics' Magazine, 
vol. xxx, has communicated a very imperfect figure of this engine to that 
work, extracted from an English book, published in 1590, entitled " A 
Treatise named Lucarsolace, divided into four books, which in part 
are collected out of diverse authors, diverse languages, and in part 
devised by Cyprian Lucar, Gentleman." London : 1590. It is very 
obvious that Lucar copied the engine in question from Besson's work, 
which was published in 1579, but was authorized to be printed in 1568 ; 
and which Besson's death then prevented. The following extract from 
Lucar's book is not without interest. "And here at the end of this chapter 
I will set before your eyes a type of a ' squirt' which hath been de- 
vised to cast much water upon a burning house, wishing a like squirt and 
plenty of water to be alwaies in a readinesse where fire may do harme ; for 
this kind of squirt may be made to holde an hoggeshed of water, or if you 
will, a greater quantity thereof, and may be so placed on his frame, that 
with ease and a smal strength, it sahl be mounted, imbased or turned to 
any one side, right against any fired marke, and made to squirt out the 
water upon the fire that is to be quenched." 

The Germans were proverbially in advance of the rest of Europe in 
the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries, in almost every department of the arts. 
" The excellency of these people [observes Heylin in his Cosmography] 
lieth in the mechanic part of learning, as being eminent for many mathe- 
matical experiments, strange watcr-ivorks, medicinal extractions, chemistry, 
the art of printing, and inventions of like noble nature, to the no less be- 
nefit than admiration of the world." As early as A. D. 1518, some kind 
of fire-engines were used in Augsburg, being mentioned in the building 
accounts of that city. They were named " instruments for fires," and 
" water syringes useful at fires." Their particular construction is unknown ; 
but from a remark in the accounts respecting wheels and poles, they are 
supposed to have been placed on carriages : they were probably large 
syringes and mounted like the one represented in the last figure. 

The oldest pu??ip engines of modern times were certainly made in Ger- 
many, and about the close of the 16th or beginning of the next century. 
The first one noticed by Beckman is that of Hautsch, which the Jesuit 



Chap. 7.] 



Pump Engine from Decaus. 



319 



Schottus saw tried, at Nuremberg in 1656. In giving an account of it, 
Schottus remarks that the invention was not then new, it being known in 
other cities, and he himself remembered having seen a small one in his 
native city (Konigshofen) forty years before, consequently about *1617. 
We are not informed by either the professor or Jesuit pf the particular 
construction of this small engine, but there is a book extant that was pub- 
lished m 1615, which contains a figure and description of a German 
engine of that time, and which furnishes the information desired. This 
book is the "Forcible Movements" of Decaus, a work which, like the 
Theatre des Instrumens of Besson, escaped the notice of Beckman. a 




No. 144. German Pump Engine from Decaus. A. D. 1615. 

This machine is named " A rare and necessary Engin, by which yon 
may give great reliefe to houses that are on fire :" we give the whole of 
the explanation : "This engin is much practiced in Germany, and it hath 
been seen what great and ready help it may bring ; for although the fire 
be 40 foot high, the said engin shall there cast its water by help of four 
or five men lifting up and putting down a long handle, in form of a lever, 
where the handle of the pump is fastned : the said pump is easily un- 
derstood : there are two suckers [valves] within it, one below to open when 
the handle is lifted up, and to shut when it is put down ; and another to 
open to let out the water : and at the end of the said engin there is a man 
which holds the copper pipe, turning it to and again to the place where 
the fire shall -be." In other words, this was a single forcing pump, such 
as figured at No. 118, and secured in a tub. For the convenience of 



a Of Decaus' history scarcely any thing is known — even his name is left in doubt, for 
he is sometimes named Isaak, at others Solomon de Caus. An account of his book may 
be seen in Stuart's Anecdotes of the S team-Engine, vol. i, p. 27. But there seems to be 
an error in the note given of the English translation by Leak, which is stated to have 
been made in 1707, whereas the copy in oar possession is dated nearly fifty years ear- 
lier. It is entitled " New and rare inventions of Water-works, shewing the easiest 
waies to raise water higher then the spring ; by which invention the perpetual motion 
is proposed, many hard labours performed and varieties of motions and sounds pro 
dnced. A work both useful!, profitable and deiightfull for all sorts of people : first 
written in French by Isaak de Caus, a late famous Engenier, and now translated into 
English by John Leak." Loudon : printed by and for Joseph Moxon, 1659. 



320 Engines and Squirts at the Fire of London, 1666. [Book IIL 

transportation the whole was placed on a sled, and dragged to a fire by 
ropes. The bore of the forcing pipe seems to have been small compared 
with that of the pump cylinder, a circumstance combined with the long 
lever and the number of men employed in working the latter, that contri- 
buted to increase the elevation of the jet. This machine exhibits a de- 
cided improvement on the primitive syringe, and constitutes a great step 
towards the modern engine. In the short angular tube to which the jet 
pipe is attached, we behold the germ of the more valuable goose-neck. 

Notwithstanding the superiority of pump engines over the syringe, many 
years elapsed before they were generally adopted. " The English [ob- 
serves a British writer] appear to have been unacquainted with the pro- 
gress made by the German engineers ; or to have been very slow in 
availing themselves of their discoveries, for at the close of the 16th cen- 
tury " hand squirts" were first introduced in London for extinguishing 
fires; and it was not till the beginning of the next, that they began to 
place them in portable and larger reservoirs — when placed in the latter 
and worked by a lever, the engines thus obtained were considered a great 
mechanical achievement ; for when in 1633, three of them were taken to 
extinguish a large fire on London bridge, they were considered " such 
excellent things, that nothing that was ever devised could do so much 
good, yet none of them did prosper, for they were all broken." The ob- 
servation that " hand squirts" or syringes were placed in reservoirs and 
then worked by a lever is not strictly correct : they were small forcing 
pumps that were employed. A syringe could not act at all if permanently 
fixed in a vessel, because it discharges the water through the same orifice 
by which it receives it. Some improvements were made on fire-engines 
by Greatorix in 1656, as mentioned by Evelyn : what they were is not 
known. The probability is, that they related to the carriage or sled. If 
his engines were the same that were advertised in 1658, this was the 
case, for they were recommended as " more traversable in less room, and 
more portable than formerly used." Fosbroke's Encyc. Antiq. 

But the fire-engine as thus improved had still many imperfections : the 
water was projected in spurts as from a syringe ; and the jet not only 
ceased with the stroke of the piston, but a portion of the water was in 
consequence lost by falling between the fire and engine at the termination 
of each stroke. An obvious mode of rendering the jet constant was by 
connecting two pumps to one discharging pipe, (as in the figure of Heron's,) 
and working the pistons alternately either by a double lever or two single 
ones. This was first adopted by the old German engineers, and thus 
another step was taken towards perfecting these useful instruments. In- 
stead of a circular tub, a square box or cistern was adopted and mounted 
on four solid wheels in place of a sled ; and a strainer, or false bottom, 
perforated with numerous small holes, was placed within the cistern to 
prevent gravel or dirt, thrown in with the water, from entering the pump. 
Such appear to have been the best fire-engines in England when the 
great fire in London occurred in 1666. They are referred to in the official 
account of the fire, dated Whitehall, September 8th, of the same year — 
" this lamentable fire in a short time became too big to be managed by any 
engines." But nothing can show their general inefficiency in a stronger 
light than the measures adopted by the city government the following year 
to guard against a similar calamity. Instead of relying upon engines, they 
seem to have retained their confidence in the old syringe. 

1. By an act of the Common Council, the city was divided into four 
districts, and " each thereof was to be provided with eight hundred lea- 
thern buckets — fifty ladders, of different sizes, from twelve to forty-two 



Chap. 7.] English Engines in 1633. 321 

feet in len°th — two brazen hand squirts to each parish — four-and-twenty 
pickax sledges — and forty shod shovels. 

• 2. That each of the twelve companies provide themselves with an en- 
gine — thirty buckets — three ladders — six pickax sledges — and two hand 
squirts ; to be ready upon all occasions. And the inferior companies such 
a number of small engines and buckets, as should be allotted them by the 
Lord Mayor and court of Aldermen. 

3. That the Aldermen passed the office of Shrievalty, do provide their 
several houses with four-and-twenty buckets, and one hand squirt each 
and those who have not served that office, twelve buckets and one liana 
squirt each. 

4. And for the effectual supplying the engines and squirts with water, 
pumps were to be placed in all wells ; and fire plugs in the several main 
pipes belonging to the New River and Thames Water- works." Maitland. 

The oldest account of English fire-engines that we have seen is in a 
small old quarto in our possession, the title page of which is wanting. 
From two poetical addresses to the author, it appears that the initial let- 
ters of his name were I. B., and that the work was entitled " A Treatise 
on Art and Nature." Two thirds of it are occupied with " water-works," 
and the rest with "fier- works," except four or five pages "on voyces, cals, 
cryes and sounds :" i. e. on making of whistles, &c. for sportsmen to imi- 
tate the voices of certain birds and other game. The date of publication 
was about 1634 : this, we infer from page 51, where, speaking of" The 
engin near the north end of London bridge, [he observes] which engin I 
circumspectly vieued as I accidentally passed by, immediately after the 
late fier that was upon the bridge. Anno 1633." Shops and dwelling 
houses were built on both sides of the bridge at that time. 

After describing several modes of raising water by sucking, forcing and 
chain pumps, he continues : — " Having sufficiently spoken concerning 
mils and engins for mounting water for meer conveyance, thence we may 
derive divers squirts and petty engins to be drawn upon wheeles from 
place to place, for to quench fier among buildings ; the use whereof hath 
been found very commodious and profitable in cities and great townes." 
Hence engines were at this time not uncommon in England. No less 
than seven are figured by the author, and all are placed in cisterns or tubs 
mounted on wheels : neither air vessels nor hose pipes are described or 
mentioned. Five of the engines consist of single cylinders ; of these some 
are in a perpendicular position, others are laid horizontally, and one is 
inverted, and fed by a branch pipe covered by a valve. The last one figured 
has two horizontal cylinders, a suggestion of the author's, and the piston 
rods are shown as worked alternately by pallets or arms on a vertical 
shaft, to which a reciprocating rotary movement was imparted by pushing 
a horizontal lever to and fro. One of these old fire-engines is a species 
of bellows pump, the construction of which we will endeavour to explain: 
Two brass vessels were connected at their open ends to a bag of lea- 
ther : they resemble, both in shape and size, two men's hats, the linings 
of which being pulled out and sewed together form a cylindrical bag 
between them. A circular opening, six or seven inches in diameter, was 
made through a horizontal piece of plank fixed in the cistern of the engine, 
and over this opening one of the vessels, with its crown upwards, was 
placed, and made fast by screws through the rim : the other vessel being 
suspended from it by the bag and hanging loosely in the water. Within 
the lower vessel (in the centre of its bottom) a valve opening upwards ad- 
mitted the water, and on the top or crown of the upper vessel, another 
valve, also opening upwards, was placed. Over the last valve the base of 

41 



322 Extract from Harris's History of Inventers. [Book III. 

the jet pipe was secured. To work this machine, the rim of the lower 
vessel was connected at opposite points, by two iron rods or slings and a 
cross head, to the end of a lever, by which the lower vessel was moved up 
and down — compressing the bag when raised, and stretching it to its 
natural length when lowered; like the lantern bellows No. 105, or the bel- 
lows pump No. 106. To make the vessel rise and fall perpendicularly, 
the two rods were passed through holes in the plank. Water was kept 
in the cistern as high as the plank; so that when the movable vessel was 
raised the contents of the bag would be forced into the upper vessel and 
expelled through the jet pipe, and when it was again lowered, the water 
would enter through its valve and fill both as before. These engines, he 
observes, had sometimes two levers and were worked by two men, " the 
lower brasse [vessel] being poysed with two sweeps." 

The goose-neck was used in England at this time. It is not represented 
in the figures, which are verv indifferently executed, but is sufficiently 
well defined in the description of one of the engines. The author directs 
a hollow ball to be placed on the orifice of the forcing pipe, " having a 
[jet] pipe at the top of it, and made to screw another pipe [elbow] upon 
it, to direct the water to any place" 

Small or hand engines continued to be employed in London in the 18th 
century. This appears from a law passed in the 6th year of Queen Anne's 
reign, by which it was enacted that " each parish shall keep a large en- 
gine, and an hand, engine, and a leather pipe, and socket of the same size 
as the plug or fire cock, [of the water mains,] that the socket may be put 
into the pipe to convey the water clear to the engine," under a penalty of 
ten pounds. In case of a fire, the first person who arrived with a parish 
engine to extinguish it was entitled to thirty shillings- — the second twenty, 
and the third ten, provided the engines were in good order, "with a socket 
or hose, or leather pipe." The following year, the owners or keepers of 
" other large engines," (not parish engines,) were entitled to the same 
reward upon arriving with them and assisting in extinguishing a fire. 

It is a singular proof of the general ignorance of hydraulic machinery, 
or want of enterprise in London pump makers of the 16th and 17th cen- 
turies, that they so long continued the use of " squirts" and engines with 
single cylinders, when they had daily before their eyes in the Thames 
Water-works examples of the advantages of combining two or more to 
one pipe. The application also of such machines as fire-engines was ob- 
viously enough shown to them ; for when Maurice had finished his labors 
in 1582, the mayor and aldermen went to witness an experiment with his 
pumps at London bridge : " and they saw him throw the water over Saint 
Magnus's steeple, before which time [says Stow] no such thing was known 
in England as this raising of water." Immediately subsequent to the above 
date, the " squirt" manufacturers might surely have imitated Maurice's 
machine, but they did not for nearly a hundred years afterwards ; that is, 
not until such engines had been introduced a second time from Germany, 
and designed expressly to put out fires. 

Before the improvements of Newsham and his contemporaries of the 
18th century, some important additions would seem to have been made 
in England, since, previous to 1686 " the engine for extinguishing fire" 
was claimed as an English invention. This is stated in a small volume pub- 
lished that year in London by John Harris, and apparently edited by him. 
It is entitled " A pleasant and compendious history of the first inventers 
and instituters of the most famous arts, misteries, laws, customs and 
manners in the whole world, together with many other rarities and re- 
markable things rarely made known, and never before made public : to 



Chap. 8.J Large Engine made by Hautsch at Nuremberg, 1656. 323 

which is added several curious inventions, peculiarly attributed to Eng- 
land and English men." We shall offer no apology for closing this chap- 
ter with the following abstract, although the concluding part only refers to 
our subject. " Fine Spanish needles were first made in England by a 
Negro in Cheapside, who refused to communicate his art ; but in the 
eighth year of Queen Elizabeth's reign, Elias Corous, a German, made 
it known to the English. About the fifth year of Queen Elizabeth, the way 
of making pins was found out by the English, which before were brought 
in by strangers to the value of 60,000 pound a year. Watches were the 
invention of a German, and the invention brought into England Anno 1580. 
The famous inventers and improvers were Cornelius Van Dreble and 
Janus Torrianellus. The first clocks were brought into England much 
about the same time. Chaines for watches are said to be the invention of 
Mr. Tomackee. The engine for clock wheels is an English invention of 
about one hundred years standing, as likewise that for the speedy cutting 
down wheels for watches. Other late inventions there are, to whom as 
their inventers the English lay claime, as an engine for raising glass, an, 
engine for spinning glass, an engine for cutting tobacco, the rouling press, 
the art of damasking linnen, and watering of silks, the way of separating 
gold from silver and brass, boulting mills, making caine chairs, the curious 
art of colouring and marbling books, making of horn ware, and the engine 
to extinguish fire, and the like." 



CHAP TER VIII. 

Fire-engines continued: Engines by Hautsch — Nuremberg — Fire-engines at Strasbourg and Ypres 
— Coupling screws — Old engine with air chamber — Canvas and leather hose and Dutch engines — En- 
gines of Perier and Leopold — Old English engines — Newsham's engines — Modern French engine — Air 
chambers — Table of the height of jets — Modes of working flre-engines — Engines worked by steam. Fire 
engines in America : Regulations respecting fires in New Amsterdam — Proclamations of Governor 
Stuyvesant — Extracts from old minutes of the Common Council — First fire-engines — Philadelphia and 
New-York engines — Riveted hose — Steam fire-engines now being constructed. Devices to extinguish 
fire without engines — Water bombs — Protecting buildings from fire — Fire escapes— Couvre feu — curfew 
bells — Measuring time with candles — Ancient laws respecting fires and incendiaries — The dress in 
which Roman incendiaries were burnt retained in the auto da fe. 

The fire-engine mentioned in the previous chapter, which Schottus wit- 
nessed in operation at Nuremberg in 1656, appears to have been equal to 
any modern one in the effects ascribed to it, since it forced a column of 
water, an inch in diameter, to an elevation of eighty feet. One German 
author says a hundred feet. It was made by John Hautsch, who, like 
most of the old inventors, endeavored to keep the construction of his 
machine a secret. He refused to allow Schottus to examine its interior ; 
though the latter it is said readily conceived the arrangement, and from 
his account it has been supposed the cylinders were placed in a horizontal 
position. The cistern that contained the pumps was eight feet long, two 
in breadth, and four deep ; it stood on a sled ten feet in length and four in 
width, and the whole was drawn by two horses. The levers were so ar- 
ranged that twenty-eight men could be employed in working them. The 
manufacture of these engines was continued by George Hautsch, the son, 
who is supposed to have made improvements m them, as some writers as- 
cribe the invention of fire-engines to him. 



324 



Strasbourg Firc-Engi?ie. 



[Book III. 



In the 16th century no place could have furnished equal facilities with 
Nuremberg- for the fabrication of, and making experiments with, hydraulic 
machines. It was at that time the Birmingham of Europe. "Nuremberg 
brass" was celebrated for ages. Its mechanics were so numerous that, 
for fear of tumults, they were not allowed to assemble in public " except 
at worship, weddings and funerals." No other place, observes an old 
writer, had " so great a number of curious workmen in all metals." The 
Hautschs seem to have been favorites with the genius of invention that 
presided over the city ; an aptitude for and an inclination to pursue me- 
chanical researches were inherited by the family. From a remark of Dr. 
Agricola of Ratisbon, in his curious work on Gardening, we learn that 
one of them did not confine himself to devices for throwing streams of 
water into the air ; for he contrived a machine by means of which he in- 
tended to raise himself into the upper regions. " What can be more ridi- 
culous [exclaims the author just named] than the art of flying sailing 
or swimming in the air 1 Yet we find there have been some who have 
practiced it, particularly one Hautscli of Nuremberg, who is much spoken 
of for his flying engine. In the mean time it is well for the world that 
these attempts have not succeeded; for how should we seize malefactors] 
They would fly over the walls of towns like Apelles Vocales, who they 
tell us saved himself by flying over the walls of Nuremberg, and the print 
of whose feet is there shown to strangers to this day." The art of fly- 
ing was a standard subject with Nuremberg mechanics for centuries 
and several curious results are recorded, but perhaps- nothing more so 
than the above objection to it. 




No. 145. Fire-engine belonging to Strasbourg, A. D. 1739. 

For nearly a hundred years after the date of Hautsch's engine those 
used throughout Europe, with the exception perhaps of a few cities in 
Germany, were very similar to those described by Belidor, as employed 
in France in his time. They consisted simply of two pumps placed in a 
chest or cistern that was moved on wheels or sleds, and sometimes carried 
by men like the old sedan chair. These engines differed from each other 
only in their dimensions and the modes of working them. Nos. 145 and 
140 will c-onvey a pretty correct idea of them during the early part 
of the 18th century. The former belonged to Strasbourg, the latter to Ypres. 



Chap. 8.] 



Fire-Engine at Ypres. 



325 



The front part of the cistern in which the pumps are fixed, is separated 
by a perforated board from the hinder part, into which the water was 
poured from -buckets. The cylinders were four inches in diameter, and 
the pistons had a stroke often inches. Each pump was worked by a t sepa- 
rate lever, A A; an injudicious plan, since a very few hands could be 
employed on each ; and as the engine had no air vessel it was necessary, 
in order to keep up the jet, that the piston should be raised and depressed 
alternately — a condition not easily performed by individuals unused to the 
operation, and acting under the excitement of a spreading conflagration. 
The contrivance for changing the direction of the jet was very defective, 
and considering the date of this engine it is surprising that such a one was 
then in use. A short leathern pipe would have been much better. It 
will be perceived that the jet pipe is connected to the perpendicular or 
fixed one by a single elbow, instead of a double one, like the ordinary 
goose-neck. The joints were also made differently. The short elbow 
piece had a collar or ring round each end, and the jet and perpendicular 
pipes, where they were united to the elbow, the same. The faces of 
these collars were made smooth, so as to fit close to and at the same time 
turn on each other : loose flanches on the pipes were bolted to others on 
the elbow, and thus drew the collars together so as to prevent water 
from leaking through. Now it will be seen that although the joint which 
unites the elbow to the perpendicular pipe would allow the jet pipe to be 
turned in a lateral or horizontal direction, there appears no provision to 
raise or to lower it, and no apparent use at all for the other joint. We 
were at first at a loss to divme how the stream could be directed up and 
down as occasions might require, for Belidor has not explained it ; but on 
examining more closely the figure in his work, we found that the jet pipe 
itself was not straight, but bent near its junction with the elbow : this dis- 
solved the mystery, for it was then obvious that by twisting this pipe 
round in its joint, its smaller orifice could be inclined up or down at plea- 
sure. This very imperfect device is also shown in the next figure, the 
jet pipe being curved through its whole length, instead of a single bend as 
in the last one. 




No. 146. Fire-engine at Ypres, A. D 1739. 

The pumps of this engine are substantially the same as those of the last, 
but the piston rods are moved by a short vibrating beam placed directly 



326 Fire Engine [Book III. 

over the cylinders. The axle of the beam is continued through both sides 
of the wooden case, and to its squared ends two iron rods are fitted, like 
crank handles on the axles of grindstones. To the lower ends of these 
rods are attached, by bolts, two horizontal bars of wood, on the outside of 
which a number of long pins are inserted, as shown in the cut. When 
the engine was in use men laid hold on these pins, one man to each, and 
pushed and pulled the bars to and fro, somewhat as in the act of rowing, 
and thus imparted the requisite movement to the pistons : a mode of work- 
ing fire-engines that might, we think, be adopted with advantage in mo- 
dern ones ; for the vigorous working of these is so exhausting, that the 
strongest man can hardly endure it over a minute at a time. The jet pipe 
of this engine is connected to the other by coupling screws or " union 
joints," the most useful and ingenious device for joining tubes that ever was 
invented; and one which, from its extensive application in practical hy- 
draulics, in gas and steam works, and also in philosophical apparatus, has 
become indispensable. We notice it here on account of its having been 
erroneously attributed to a modern engineer ; whereas it was not new 
when introduced into Ypres fire-engines above a hundred years ago. 

Two of the greatest improvements ever made in these machines were 
introduced about the same time, viz : the air chamber and flexible pipes 
of leather and canvas ; upon these principally the efficiency of modern 
engines depends. By the former the stream ejected from a single pump is 
rendered continuous ; and by the latter, it is no longer necessary to take 
the engine itself into, or close to, a building on fire ; where in most cases 
it is impossible, from the heat of the flames and from smoke, to use it with 
effect. The modern author, or rather introducer, of the beautiful device 
for rendering the broken or interrupted jets of old engines uniform, is not 
known. In accordance with the customs of the age, he probably kept it 
secret as long as he could. We suspect that Hautsch's engine was fur- 
nished with an air chamber, and that it was on that account chiefly that he 
was so anxious to prevent its construction from becoming known. Beck- 
man states that Hautsch used a flexible pipe to enable him readily to change 
the direction of the jet, "but not an air chamber, which Schottus certainly 
would have described." How Schottus could have done this, when ac- 
cording to Prof. B. himself, Hautsch refused to let him see the interior of 
the engine, it is difficult . to imagine; and unless he had been acquainted 
with the properties of an air vessel, had the engine even been thrown open 
to his inspection, he could hardly have comprehended its action, unless 
explained to him by the manufacturer; at any rate, the secret, if it was in 
Hautsch's possession, was not long after divulged ; for in 1675 an anony- 
mous writer in the Journal ales Scavans figured and described an engine 
with this appendage, The account was the same year translated and pub- 
lished in volume xi of the Philosophical Transactions, p. 679. As this 
is the earliest notice of the application of an air vessel to pumps in modern 
times that we have met with, it is entitled to a place here. 

" This engine [No. 147] is a chest of copper, pierced with many holes 
above, and holds within it the body of a pump whose sucker is raised and 
abased by two levers. These levers having each of them two arms, and each 
arm being fitted to be laid hold on by both hands of a man. Each lever 
is pierced in the middle by a mortaise, in which an iron nail [bolt] which 
passes through the handle [rod] of the sucker, turns when the sucker is 
raised or lowered. Near the body of the puYnp there is a copper pot, 
I, [air vessel] joined to it by the tube G, and having another tube K N L, 
which in N may be turned every way. To make this engine play, water 
is poured upon the chest to enter in at the holes that are in the cover 



Chap. 8.J 



With Air Vessel, A. D. 1675. 



327 



thereof. The water is drawn in to the body of the pump at the hole F, 
at the time when the sucker is raised ; and when the same is let down, 
.the valve of the same hole shuts, and forces the water to pass through the 
hole into the tube Gr of which the valve being lifted up, the water enters 
into the pot, and filling the bottom it enters through the hole into the tube 
K N L in such a manner, that when the water is higher than the [orifice 
of the] tube K, and the hole of the tube Gr is shut by the valve , the air in- 
closed in the pot hath no issue, and it comes to pass, that when you con- 
tinue to make the water enter into the pot by the tube G, which is much 
thicker [larger] than the aperture of the end L, at which it must issue, it 
must needs be, that the surplus of the water that enters into the pot, and 
exceeds that which at the same times issues through the small end of the 
jet, compresses the air to find place in the pot ; which makes that, whilst 
the sucker is raised again to make new water to enter into the body of the 
pump, the air which has been compressed in the pot drives the surplus of 
the water by the force of its spring, meantime that a new compression of 
the sucker, makes new water to enter and causes also a new compression 
of the air. And thus the course of the water, which issues by the jet, is 
always entertained in the same state." The box or chest had two pro- 
jecting pieces on each side, through which two staves were passed for the 
convenience of carrying it. This small engine appears to have been in 
every respect an effective one ; the whole of the parts, both of the pump 
and apparatus for working it, were well adapted to produce the best ef- 
fect. The goose-neck seems to have been formed of a species of ball 
and socket joint. 




No. 147. View and Section of a Fire -engine with Air Vessel. A. D. 1675. 

One might suppose that when this account of the construction and ef- 
fects of air chambers was published to the world, and in the standard 
journals of France and England, that they would speedily have been 
adopted in fire-engines throughout Europe. Such, however, was not the 
fact ; on the contrary, they appear to have remained comparatively un- 
known for nearly fifty years longer ; for it was not till the expiration of 
the first quarter of the 18th century that they began to be much used, and 
some years more elapsed before they were generally employed. We can 
only account for this by the limited circulation of the scientific journals 
named, and their being confined principally to learned men ; who then as 
formerly felt indifferent towards mechanical researches : mechanics in 
those days were no great readers, and the few who possessed a taste for 



328 Dutch Engines and Hose Pipe. [Book III. 

books were commonly without the means to gratify it. It is however, 
singular that this account of the air vessel should have escaped the re- 
searches of Beckman, and especially so as it was republished in 1704 by 
Harris in his Lexicon Technicum, and in 1705 by Lowthorp in the abridg- 
ment of the Philosophical Transactions. He observes, " I can find no 
older engine with an air chamber than that described by Perrault, and of 
which he has given a figure. He says it was preserved in the king's 
library at Paris ; that it was employed for throwing water to a great 
height during fires ; and that it had only one cylinder, and yet threw out 
a continued jet of water. He neither mentions the period of the invention 
nor the name of the inventor, and I can only add that his book was printed 
in 1684." Beckman, in a note, states that he had not seen the first edi- 
tion of Perrault's work, and therefore knew not whether the French en- 
gine was described in it. We may here make the same remark, since the 
only copy in our possession is of the edition of 1684, having endeavored, 
but without success, to procure an impression of the previous one. 

In 1672 hose or leathern tubes were first publicly used, in modern times, 
to convey water from engines to fires by John and Nicholas Van der 
Heide, in Amsterdam, of which city they were inspectors or superintend- 
ents of fire apparatus. They made the tubes in fifty feet lengths, with 
brass screws fitted to the ends, so that any number could quickly be con- 
nected together, as occasions might require. The introduction of hose 
pipes forms an epoch in the history of fire-engines, for they wonderfully 
increased the effect and extended the application of these machines. Pre- 
vious to their adoption large engines could not be used to extinguish fires 
in the interior of dwellings — it was only when the flames burst through 
the windows or roof, that they came into play ; and even then, it was often 
with difficulty and danger that they could be brought sufficiently near to 
discharge the water with effect, while in most cases the jet was so much 
diffused by the resistance of the air or wind as to descend rather in a 
shower of spray than in a compact stream. For want of hose the engines 
themselves were also frequently burnt ; this was indeed a common occur- 
rence, and is often mentioned in the notices of conflagrations. In the great 
fire of London the rapid spread of the flames drove the firemen from their 
engines, and many were consumed. In 1731 a great part of the town of 
Blandford, England, was destroyed, and in an account published by one 
of the sufferers, it is said " the engines were play'd, but were soon burnt." 
This loss of engines was invariably caused by the want of hose ; for when 
plenty of the latter is at hand, the former can be placed and worked at 
any convenient distance from the fire, and the liquid discharged upon 
almost any part of it. 

Another advantage resulting from the introduction of leathern pipes 
was in making the engines supply themselves. Before the use of hose, 
water was poured from buckets into the cistern in which the pumps were 
placed ; hence when a fire broke out, one of the first objects was to form 
a lane of men, extending from the engine to the nearest rivulet, pond, 
well, or other source of water ; those on one side passed along the full 
buckets to the engine, while those on the other returned the empty ones. To 
dispense with this number of men, the Van der Heides screwed one end 
of a hose, pipe to the lower part of the cistern and extended the other to 
the edge of a pond or well, where its orifice was widened into a bag that 
was kept open by a frame. Into this bag the labourers poured the con- 
tents of their buckets, and sometimes portable pumps were used to raise 
water into it, for it was necessary that it should be sufficiently elevated 
above the cistern of the engine that its contents might readily flow into 



Chap. 8.] Perier's Engines. 329 

the latter. This was the first step towards using suction hose, and con- 
sequently towards making an engine supply itself. Perhaps it may be 
thought strange that they did not adopt this plan at first instead of the 
'device just described, but in point in fact they could not, for before suc- 
tion pipes could be used, a radical change was required in the construe 
tion of the lower parts of the pumps, and one that could not without much 
difficulty and expense be made in the old engines. Hence the Van der 
Heides very properly preferred making new machines altogether ; to 
which they adapted suction pipes. These great improvements were 
made about 1675. In 1677, one or both of the Van der Heides obtained 
an exclusive privilege to construct such engines for twenty-five years. In 
1695 there were in Amsterdam upwards of sixty of their engines, and 
when a fire broke out, the six that were located nearest were taken to 
extinguish it. The use of leather and canvas hose became general in the 
nexLcentury. In 1720 the latter was woven without seams in Leipsic 
and other places in Germany. 

Whether the engines of the Van der Heides had air vessels is not ascer- 
tained ; Professor Beckman says their internal construction is no where 
represented. There is strong evidence that they had none ; for so late 
as the first quarter of the 18th century, the Dutch engines were not gener- 
ally furnished with them, and this would certainly not have been the case 
had they ever been " common in all the towns of the Netherlands," as Van 
der Heide's engines were. Mr. Chambers, in his Cyclopedia, A. D. 1728, 
observes, article Hydrocanisteriui?i, " The Dutch and others use a long 
flexible tube of leather, sail-cloth, or the like, which they carry or conduct 
in the hand, from one room to another, as occasion requires ; so that the 
engine may be applied where the fire is only withinside, and does not 
burst out to expose it to its external action. To improve on this original 
fire-engine, they have since contrived to make it yield a continual stream." 
At the time Belidor wrote, air vessels were not common in Holland, and 
in 1744, Desaguliers speaking of their advantages, remarks, " In the use 
of engines to put out fires which have no air vessels, like the Dutch en- 
gines, or old parish engines, a great deal of water is lost at the beginning 
and end of the jet or spouting of the water." Philos. ii, 164. Beckman 
says, it is certain that air vessels were not common in Germany till after 
they were used by Leopold. 

Perier in France, Leopold in Germany, and Newsham in England, 
contemporaneous engine makers in the early part of the 18th century, 
were greatly celebrated in their respective countries. They were some- 
times considered inventors of the fire engine, though very erroneously, 
for so far as the principle of its construction, application of the air ves- 
sel, goose-neck, flexible pipes of leather and canvas, the connection of 
these by screws, &c. were concerned, the engine was perfected before 
their time ; indeed not one of them contributed any thing essential to it. 
Their merit consisted in improving these machines in various minor details ; 
in the arrangement of the different parts, construction of the carriages, 
mode of communicating motion to the pistons, and in rendering the whole 
more durable and efficient by superior workmanship and materials. In 
these respects the English engineer, we believe surpassed his competitors, 
but then he was the last of the three that entered the field, for Perier started 
before Leopold, and both were some years in advance of Newsham. 

No account of Perier's engines is to be found in modern books ; even 
Belidor has taken no notice of them. To supply this deficiency, we in- 
tended to insert a figure of one, taken from the 2d ed. of Poliniere's "Ex- 
periences de Physique," Paris, 1718, (the only work with which we are 
acquainted that contains a representation of them,) but on account of the 

42 



330 Perier's Engines. [Book III 

unusual number of illustrations required in this chapter, it is omitted. A 
short description will suffice. After describing an atmospheric pump be- 
longing to the arsenal of Paris, and another attached to a hotel in the fau- 
bourg St. Antoine, which had two spouts and two valves in the suction 
pipe, the author observes, J'ay vu a Paris des pompes dont on se sert pour 
tacher d' eteindre le feu quand il arrive des incendies; and he then enters 
into a minute description of one of these Parisian engines. In its general 
appearance it resembled the Dutch one No. 148, consisting of two work- 
ing cylinders with an air vessel between them, the piston rods moved by 
a double lever, through the ends of which staves four feet in length were 
inserted. The pump cylinders were sixteen inches long and four in dia- 
meter, but instead of being placed in a square wooden box or cistern, 
they were secured in an open copper pan, of an oval shape, and the same 
depth as the cylinders, and fastened by bolts to a base of wood or piece 
of plank, to the four corners of which short ropes were fastened. At one 
end of the pan, the leather hose which conveyed the water to the fire was 
connected by a screw to a copper pipe that communicated with the lower 
part of the air chamber. The leather tubes, Poliniere observes, were 
lubricated with a composition of tallow and wax to render them pliable ; 
and, to prevent mice and other vermin from destroying them, soaked in 
an infusion of colycinth or bitter apple. In furnishing the pumps with 
water, Perier adopted the first device of the Van der Heides, and hence 
we infer that he was ignorant of the better mode of making them supply 
themselves through suction pipes. As they could only draw water out of 
the vessel in which they were placed, and it being too small and inconve- 
nient for numbers of people to pour the contents of their buckets into it 
when the engine was in use, a canvas or sail cloth bag, coated with 
pitch or tar, was connected by a flexible pipe of the same material, to the 
lower part of the pan. This bag was of a conical form, the wide end be- 
ing uppermost, and supported with the mouth open on a folding frame, 
something like a high camp stool. Into this bag the water for the supply 
of the pumps was poured. It might of course be placed at any conveni- 
ent distance from the engine, by means of additional lengths of pipes that 
were always kept ready and which were connected together by screws. 
These engines, Poliniere says, forced the water through the orifice of the 
jet pipe to a surprising distance. He observes also that smaller ones were 
in use ; which consisted of a single cylinder and air chamber, and were 
worked by a single lever. 

The following extract relating to Perier's engine is from the Diction- 
naire CEconomique, 3d. edit. Paris, 1732, from which it appears that at 
that date they were small affairs, and differed but little from our garden 
engines ; in other words, they were then nothing more than po??ipcs porta- 
tive, the name by which they were designated at the first. " La pompe 
que le Sieur du Perier a inventee ou perfectionnee est tres commode dans 
les incendies. Deux hommes la peuvent aisement transporter avec tout 
son attirail, et la placer dans tel lieu que Ton voudra. II n'est pas neces- 
saire qu'elle soit dans l'endroit ou se trouve l'eau, il y a un canal de coutil 
cire en dedans, qui sert a conduire l'eau jusqu'a'la pompe. Ce canal 
peut etre augmente en y adaptant d'autres canaux faits de la m£me facon. 
La pompe etant placee dans le lieu le plus commode, ou peut encore por- 
ter l'eau dans le plus fort de l'incendie par le moien d'un canal, qui est 
fait de cuir, et qu'on augmente, autant qu'on veut, en y ajoutant d'autres 
canaux par le moien de quelques vis. La matiere dont est compose, ce 
canal donne la facilite de passer d'un appartement dans l'autre pour ap- 
pliquer l'eau dans l'endroit le plus necessaire. Les circonvolutions du 



Chap 8.] 



Leopold's Engines. 



331 



canal n'emp£chent point l'eau d'agir avec violence, et la force avec la« 
quelle elie agit est d'autant plus grande, que les hommes qui font aller la 
pompe, emploient eux-memes plus de force, la quantite d'eau depend en- 
core du nombre de pistons." 

In 1699 Perier obtained from the king an exclusive privilege to con- 
struct fire-engines, which Professor Beckman thinks were the first public 
ones employed in Paris. In 1716 an ordinance of the king directed a 
larger number than those already in use, to be distributed in different 
parts of the city, and public notice to be given where they could be found 
in case of fire. a In 1722 there were thirty in use, besides others belong- 
ing to public buildings. As these machines had air vessels, it is strange 
that Belidor neither mentions the fact nor refers to Paris engines at all. 
After describing a Dutch one, No. 148, he quotes (as if he knew of no others 
with air vessels) Perrault's description of the one that was in the king's 
library fifty years before, and an account of another that Du Fay saw at 
Strasbourg in 1725. 

Leopold's engines do not appear to have possessed any peculiar feature 
to which he could lay claim as inventor. They seem to have been iden- 
tical or nearly so with the one described in the Journal des Savans forty 
years before, (No. 147.) Each consisted of a single pump with an air ves- 
sel enclosed in a copper chest. One man raised a jet by it to the height 
of from twenty to thirty feet. Leopold kept the construction for some 
time a secret, and with this view the pump was entirely enclosed in the 
chest ; a cover being soldered on the latter. Beckman says he made and 
sold a great number of them. In 1720 he published a description of them 
in a pamphlet; and in 1724 he inserted an account of them in his Theatrum 
Machinarum Hydraulicarum, a work published that year at Leipsic in 
three volumes folio. 

The annexed figure, No. 148, exhibits an improvement on Leopold's 

engine, having two cylinders and 
workingby a double lever. Small 
engines seem to have been prefer- 
red to those of large dimensions, 
such as were made by Hautsch, 
or those of modern times. Before 
the introduction of hose pipes, 
small ones were certainly more 
useful, since they could be carried 
into any part of a house when on 
fire, but when flexible pipes of lea- 
ther and canvas became common, 
their efficiency was not to be corn- 
No. 148. Dutch Fire-Engine. A. D. H39. pared with that of the large sizes. 
English fire-engines were much the same dimensions as those used 
on the continent till Newsham and contemporary engineers introduced 
others that approached in size those in present use ; but for several 
years after the smaller ones retained the preference. The London ma- 
nufacturers made six different sizes, the larger one only being placed 
on wheels. Even in the middle of the 18th century such as are re- 
presented by the figure on the next page were common in that city. A 
similar figure was published by Mr. Clare in 1735 in his work on the 
motion of fluids, and so late as 1765 it was described (in the London Ma- 
gazine for that year) as the engine in common use. As an indication that 




Supplement to Diet. CEconomique. Amsterdam, 1740. Tom. ii, 1G3. 



332 



English Fire-Engine of the 18th Century. [Book III 



air vessels were not used in England before the 18th century, it may be 
observed that in the year last named, those engines which had them were 
named " constant stream'd engines," to distinguish them from those that 
had none — such being called squirting engines. 




No. 149. English Fire-Engine of the middle of the 18th century. 

In 1729 Switzer published his System of Hydrostatics, in which he m 
serted the circulars of two rival engine makers — Fowke and Newsham. 
As these documents contain some interesting particulars respecting the 
state of practical hydraulics at the time, as well as of fire-engines, we insert 
some extracts from each, previous to introducing Newsham's engine. 

" Mr. Fowke, Nightingale Lane, Wapjring : makes 

" 1. Constant stream'' d engines for extinguishing fires, the large sizes play 
two streams at once, being the first and only of their kind, and does the 
office of two engines, and so contrived as to be drawn through, (and if 
occasion requires,) worked in a passage three feet wide, which no other 
can, and will feed themselves with a sucking pipe. Their movements are 
easy and natural, having a perpendicular stroke, and are without either 
rack, wheel, chain or crank, whereby the friction is lessened more than 
any others, and consequently requires less strength, are more useful, and 
less liable to disorder and decay, and much cheaper than any other ; and 
therefore are by judicious persons esteemed preferable to all others. By 
screwing a pipe they water gardens, dispersing the particles of water for 
about fourteen yards square, like small rain. The four larger sizes run 
on wheels, and the other two carried by two men like a chair. 

" 2. Engines which will work either by water, wind, horses or men, and 
so contrived that either may work at a time, or be assistant to each other, 
whereby large quantities of water may be raised, so that if the height, dis- 
tance and quantity required be known, the expense and strength may be 
calculated so as to serve cities, towns, noblemen and gentlemen's seats 
and fountains, brewers, distillers, dyers; and for draining of lands, ponds, 
and mines of lead, coal, &c. 

" 3. Pumps which may be worked by one man, for raising water out of 
any well upwards of one hundred and twenty feet deep, sufficient for the 
service of any private house or family ; and so contrived that by turning 
a cock, may supply a cistern at the top of the house, or a bathing vessel 
in any room ; and by screwing on a leather pipe, the water may be con- 
veyed either up stairs or in at a window, in case of any fire. 

"4. All manner of fancies in fountains." 



Chap. 8.] Newsham's Engines. 333 

After referring to a number of machines erected by him in London and 
its vicinity, Mr. Fowke concludes with a table of prices of fire-engines, 
the smallest being c£14 and the largest <£60. Newsham's circular is ob- 
viously designed to counteract the effect of Fowke's. 

" Richard Newsham, of Cloth Fair, London, engineer, makes the most 
useful, substantial, and convenient engines for quenching fires, which carries 
continual streams with great force. He hath play'd several of them before 
his majesty, and the nobility, at St. James's, with so general an approba- 
tion, that the largest was at the same time ordered for the use of that 
royal palace. And as a further encouragement (to prevent others from 
making the same sort, or any imitation thereof) his majesty has since been 
graciously pleas'd to grant him his second letters patent, for the better se- 
curing his property in this, and several other inventions for raising water 
from any depth, to any height required. 

" The largest engine will go through a passage about three foot wide, in 
complete working order, without taking off or putting on any thing : and 
may be worked with ten men in the said passage. One man can quickly 
and with ease, move the largest size about, in the compass it stands in: 
and is to be play'd without rocking, upon any uneven ground, with hands 
and feet, or hands only, which cannot be parallel'd by any other sort what- 
soever. There is conveniency for above twenty men to apply their full 
strength, and yet reserve both ends of the cistern clear from incumbrance, 
that others at the same time may be pouring in water, which drains through 
large copper strainers. The staves that are fixed through the leavers, 
along the sides of the engine, for the men to work by, though very light, 
as alternate motions with quick returns require ; yet will not spring and 
lose time the least : but the staves of such engines as are wrought at the 
ends of the cistern, will spring or break, if they be of such a length as is 
necessary for a large engine, when a considerable power is apply'd : and 
cannot be fix'd fast, because they must at all times be taken out before 
that engine can go through a passage. The playing two streams at once, 
do neither issue a greater quantity of water, nor is it new, or so useful, 
there having been of the like sort at the steel-yard, and other places, thirty 
or forty years ; and the water being divided, the distance and force are 
accordingly lessen'd thereby. 

" Those who pretend to make the forcers work in the barrels, with a per- 
pendicular stroke, without rack, wheels, chains, crank, pully, or the like, 
by any kind of contrived leavers, or circular motion whatsoever, with less 
friction, than if guided and work'd by wheel and chains, (which of all 
methods is the best,) do only discover their ignorance ; they may as rea- 
sonably argue, that a great weight can be dragg'd upon a sledge, with as 
little strength, as if drawn upon wheels. 

" As to the treddles, on which the men work with their feet, there is no 
method so powerful, with the like velocity or quickness, and more natural 
and safe for the men. Great attempts have been made to exceed, but none 
yet could equal this sort ; the fifth size of which hath play'd above the 
grasshopper upon the Royal Exchange ; which is upwards of fifty -five 
yards high, and this in the presence of many thousand spectators. 

" Those with suction feed themselves with water from a canal, pond, 
well, &c. or out of their own cisterns, by the turn of a cock, without in- 
terrupting the stream. They are far less liable to disorder, much more 
durable in all their parts, than any extant, and play off large quantities of 
water to a great distance, either from the engine, or a leather pipe, or 
pipes of any length requir'd ; (the screws all fitting each other.) This the 
cumbersome squirting engines, which take up four times more room, can- 



334 



Newsham's Engine. 



[Book III. 



not perform; neither do they throw one fourth part of their water on the 
fire, at the like distances, but lose it by the way; nor can they use leather 
pipe with them to much advantage, whatever necessity there may be for 
it. The five large sizes go upon wheels, well box'd with brass, fitted to 
strong iron axles, and the other is to be carried like a chair." 

No. 150 is a vertical section of the pumps 
in Newsham's engine, with the air vessel 
between them, and showing also the sectors 
and chains by which motion is transmitted 
from the levers to the piston rods, and the 
latter preserved in a perpendicular position. 
The chains are similar to watch chains in 
their construction, and the length of each 
is equal to the arc of one oi* the sectors. 
Four are used, two to each sector. Their 
mode of operation is in this manner : One 
end of a chain is fastened to the top of a 
piston rod, by a bolt and nut as represent- 
ed, and the other end riveted to the lower 
extremity of the sector; so that when the 
latter is turned down by depressing the 
lever, it necessarily draws, by this chain, 
the piston down with it. Another chain is 
fastened in the same manner to the lower 
part of the piston rod, (that is above the cy- 
linder,) and the upper extremity of the 
sector, and hence when the lever is elevated, this chain raises the piston with 
it. He probably derived the idea of thus working them from Newcomen's 
mode of working pumps by the atmospheric steam-engine. The round 
opening below the valves in the above figure, is where the suction pipe 
is continued to the hose, shown at one end of the cistern in the next figure 




No. 150. Section of Newsham's Engine. 




No. 151. Newsham's Fire-Engine, A. D. 1740. 



Chap. 8.J Modern English Engines. 335 

No. 151 is an external view of one of Newsham's engines at the time 
of his death, as drawn by Mr. Label je, the engineer of Westminster 
bridge, and inserted by Desaguliers in the second volume of his Philoso- 
phy, in 1744. Its general appearance is far inferior to modern ones, but 
the essential parts — the pumps — were equal to those now used. The 
strong iron shaft by which the pistons were raised and depressed was 
continued along the top of the cistern, and to it the levers were secured 
as at present ; but in addition to the levers, sectors, like those that moved 
the pistons, were also fastened to it — portions of two of these are shown in 
the cut, and there were two others near the upright case : to their upper 
parts, two long strips of plank, or treddles, were suspended by short 
chains, and on these planks, six men, who stopd upon the cistern and 
held by the hand rails, alternately threw their weight; first on the tred- 
dle on one side of the carriage, and then on the other, and thus aided the 
firemen at the levers in working the engine. The box or trough, with a 
grate within it, at the end of the cistern, was for the purpose of emptying 
buckets of water to supply the pumps, when the suction pipe (figured be- 
low it) was not used. The small flap on the end of the upright case co- 
vered printed directions how to use and keep the engine in order. 

If the section, No. 150, be compared with English engines in previous 
use, one of which is figured at No. 149, it will be seen at a glance how 
great were the improvements that Newsham introduced. Independently 
of the three most original of his contributions — the sectors and chains — 
treddles — and working the pumps with long staves at the sides of the 
carriage instead of short ones at the ends — the whole machine was im- 
proved more or less in every part. To keep the cistern and levers as low 
as possible, the carriage was placed on bent axles. He introduced and 
improved the three-way cock, and the goose-neck was perfected in his 
hands ; the elbows being jointed to each other by very fine screws. De- 
saguliers thought that no part of the engine could be altered for the bet- 
ter. A writer in the London Magazine for 1752, (page 395,) says that 
Newsham in these machines gave " a nobler present to his country than 
if he had added provinces to Great Britain." Their merits were gene- 
rally acknowledged : he received orders for them from various parts of 
Europe, and it will be seen in a subsequent part of this chapter that those 
first used in this city were made by him. 

The celebrity his engines acquired had a blighting effect on other ma 
nufacturers — like Aaron's rod swallowing up those of his competitors. 
His engines were purchased for the use of the parishes throughout the 
country generally, and also by the various insurance companies, which, 
unlike ours, are at the sole expense of extinguishing fires, and of provid- 
ing the means to effect it. Every insurance company in English cities 
keeps in its pay a number of firemen to take charge of and work its own 
engines. Two horses are attached to each engine to draw it to and 
from fires. The height of the jet from Newsham's engines was about 
fifty feet. He mentions in his circular having thrown it to an elevation 
o{ fifty-five yards, but he was certainly mistaken. 

Several improvements have been made in English fire-engines since 
Newsham's time, but they are chiefly confined to the carriage, and to de- 
tails and arrangements of the various parts. Treddles are dispensed with, 
and the carriages are made longer, so that a greater number of men can 
be employed in working them. They resemble American engines so 
closely, that a separate figure of a modern English engine is unnecessary. 
The reader is therefore referred to £$£. 154. Others on the principle of the 
semi-rotary pump, (No. 140,) are also used to a limited extent in London. 



336 



Modern French Engine. 



[Book III. 



The following figure of a modern French fire-engine is from the Ma- 
nuel du Fondeur ; Paris, 1829. It consists of two cylinders and an air 
vessel arranged in the usual way. One of the pumps, and half of the air 
chamber, is shown in section. The cistern is more elevated than in Eng- 
lish or American engines, and from the consequent height of the levers 
would seem more inconvenient to be worked. The suction pipe is of 
copper with folding joints, and a perforated hollow ball at the extremity to 
prevent dirt or gravel from entering with the water. A short leathern 
tube connects this pipe with the suction cock. This engine is worked at 
the ends of the carriage, and the piston rods are connected to the lever by 
slings, and made to rise and fall in a perpendicular position by radius bars 
jointed to the upper ends of the latter, and to permanent pieces that pro- 
ject from the frame that supports the fulcrum. 




No. 152. Modern French Fire-engine. 

The elevation of the jet depends upon the pressure to which the air in 
the air chamber is subjected; the elasticity or spring of that fluid being 
inversely as the space it is made to occupy. Before an engine is set to 
work the interior of the chamber, like that of all empty vessels, (to use a 
vulgar solecism,) is filled, with common air, of that degree of density in 
which it appears near the earth's surface ; but when the pumps are set to 
work, the water forced by them into the chamber crowds the air into the 
dome or upper part of that vessel, whence there is no passage for its es- 
cape; and, as the liquid accumulates, the air is condensed more and more, 
until, by its reaction on the surface of the water, it drives the latter through 
the jet or hose pipe, and with a force exactly proportioned to the degree 
of its compressure. Thus if the volume of air in the chamber be com- 
pressed into half its bulk, the jet would rise to about 32 or 33 feet, (if not 
retarded by friction, angles or other imperfections in the pipe;) and if it 
were made to occupy one third of its former space, its spring would be 
three times greater than common air, and would force the jet to an eleva- 
tion of about 64 or 66 feet ; and so on. A tabular statement, similar to 



Chap. 8.] Modes of Working Fire-Engines, 337 

the following, exhibiting the relation between the height of a jet and the 
air's compressure, has long been published. It is, however, of little use 
to practical men. We doubt if a column of water of the size of those 
thrown by ordinary engines could be raised by any means, two hundred 
feet above the orifice of the pipe whence it issued : the resistance of the 
atmosphere would disperse it before it could reach that elevation. 

Volume of air contained in the air Ratio of the air's Height to which it is said the 

chamber compressed to elasticity. water will spouL 

■J-----2--- 33 feet 
i - - - - 3 - - - 66 « 
i----4--- 99" 

£ - - - - 5 - - - 132 « 

i - - - - 6 - - - 165 " 

■f - - - - 7 - - - 198 " 

£ - - - - 8 - - - 231 " 

. . - - 9 - - - 264 " 



- - 10 - - - 297 



9 
1 

10 

Great as are the advantages derived from air chambers, some attention 
to them is required in order to secure at all times the benefit they are 
designed to impart. When neglected (and we believe few parts of an 
engine exercise the attention of firemen less) they often become actually 
injurious, for when no advantage is derived from the elasticity of the con- 
fined air, the water is impeded in its progress by passing through them. 
Upon the trial of engines it sometimes occurs that the water is thrown 
higher at their first working than after they have been a few minutes 
in use, and this notwithstanding all the efforts of the firemen to make the 
jet reach the first elevation. This result has sometimes been attributed to 
fatigue in the men — to obstacles in the pipes — to grit or sand under the 
valves, &c. whereas in fact it was often due to the air vessel alone ; i. e. 
to the escape of air from it. This escape may be occasioned by mi- 
nute leaks in the chamber, but when no such imperfections exist the air 
frequently makes its exit, and its place becomes occupied by the liquid. 
Whenever air is subjected to great pressures in contact with water, it is 
quickly absorbed by the latter, and in this way it is that it often disappears 
from the air chambers of fire-engines, and also from those of pressure-en- 
gines, Heron's fountain, water rams, &c. When a long suction hose is 
attached to an engine and the latter worked at a moderate velocity, a 
sufficient supply of air to replace that taken up by the water, commonly 
enters, unknown to the firemen, through the seams and joints ; but when 
one engine is fed by another pouring water into its cistern, there is little 
chance for the requisite supply of air, unless a minute opening were left 
in the cap that screws over the orifice of the suction pipe, at one end of 
the engine. 

The suction cocks of some engines diminish their useful effect in con- 
sequence of the holes through the plugs being smaller than other pas- 
sages for the water. 

The great desideratum in modern fire-engines is an improved mode of 
working them. At page 72 we remarked that experimental researches 
have shown the useful effect of a man working a pump, in the ordinary 
way with a lever, to be fifty per cent less than when he turns a crank ; 
and that when his strength is applied as in the act of rowing, the effect is 
nearly one hundred and fifty per cent more than in moving a pump lever 
This is sufficient to induce efforts to supersede the present mode of work- 
ing the pumps of fire-engines, and particularly so, as the labor is so se- 

43 



338 Steam Fire- Engines. [Book III. 

vere that few can continue it above a minute or two at a time, when if 
relays of men are not ready, buildings on fire are left to fate. The jars 
or concussions produced by the violent contact of the levers with the 
sides of the carriage at every stroke, is a source of waste of firemen's 
energy, and want of uniformity in their movements when at work, is 
another. In the 29th vol. of the London Mechanics' Magazine, a contri- 
vance is described for diminishing the shocks consequent on the contact 
of the levers with the carriage. It consists of three spiral springs enclosed 
in cylindrical cases secured on each side of the carriage ; pads rest on the 
springs and project above each case, and upon them the levers strike when 
pulled down. Blocks of caoutchouc were previously tried, but the vio- 
lence of the blows soon rendered that material useless. The velocity 
with which engines are sometimes worked also occasions a useless expen- 
diture of their strength ; we have seen some drawing water through long 
suction pipes, and the pumps worked so quickly that the water certainly 
had not time to pass through the hose and Jill the cylinders, ere the pis- 
tons began to descend. 

If some mode of making the carriage immovable, and the pumps were 
worked by long cranks on each side, the firemen could not only perform 
fifty per cent more labor, but they could do it with less exertion, and 
consequently endure it longer. A modification of the plan adopted in 
the Ypres engine, page 325, would be still more effective ; in addition 
to which ropes might be attached to the bars, and any number of specta- 
tors could then assist. 

If we review the progress of fire-engines in modern times, from the 
simple syringe to the splendid machines of the present day, we shall find 
that every important improvement in the apparatus for raising the water, 
was a nearer approach to the engine described by Heron. Previous to 
the 16th century, syringes or squirts only were in use, and not till the 
Spiritalia had been translated and printed do we meet with the applica- 
tion of pumps. At first a single working cylinder was employed, and the 
piston moved by a single lever as in No. 144 ; then two cylinders, each 
worked by a separate lever, were united to one discharging pipe — next 
the double lever, as figured by Heron, by which an alternating movement 
of the pistons, and a more efficient application of the force employed was 
secured ; then the goose-neck, also mentioned by Heron — and lastly, the 
air vessel made its appearance. If the beautiful and philosophical device 
last mentioned, be, as some persons have supposed, a modern invention, 
why is it that no one has ever rose up to claim it ] Is not this a tacit ad- 
mission that it was derived directly from the Spiritalia, or from Vitruvius's 
description of the machine of Ctesibius % To the ancients, then, we are 
indebted for the most valuable features in our fire-engines, and it is not 
unreasonable to conclude that those used in ancient Egypt and old Rome 
were as effective as ours. If they were not, it is very strange that Heron 
should have hit upon that construction of them and that arrangement of 
their parts, which we have only acquired after a century spent in ex- 
periments. 

Of late years " steam fire-engines" have been introduced with success 
in some parts of Europe : a small horizontal steam-engine with its boiler, 
being arranged on the carriage of the fire-engine. One large pump cylin- 
der only is used, and its piston and that of the steam cylinder are attached 
to the same rod. Mr. Braithwaite, a London engineer, was, we believe, 
the first who made one of these machines. The steam cylinder was seven 
and a half inches diameter, and the pump six and a half; the water was 
forced through an ajutage of seven-eighths of an inch, to an elevation of 



Chap. 8.] American Fire-Engines. 339 

ninety feet. The time of getting the apparatus into play from the moment 
of igniting the fuel, was eighteen minutes. When an alarm of fire was 
o-iven, the fuel was kindled and bellows attached to the engine were work- 
ed by hand. When the horses were harnessed to drag the machine to 
the fire, the bellows were worked by the motion of the wheels. (See 
London Mechanics' Magazine for 1830, and in volume xviii, for 1832, 
there is a figure and description of one made by Mr. B. for the Prussian 
government, being designed to protect the public buildings of Berlin.) 

One or two of these machines on an improved plan by Mr. Ericsson, 
are now being constructed in this city. 

Fire-engines in America. — The first use of fire-engines is an impor- 
tant event in any country, and may be considered as constituting an epoch 
in the history of its useful mechanism : moreover, wherever they are made, 
they indicate a certain degree of refinement in civilization and an ad- 
vanced state of the mechanic arts. To their introduction into this conti- 
nent, future historians may, and probably will, have recourse for data res- 
pecting the state of society in the early days of the republic, and the still 
earlier times during which the country was subject to Europe ; for the 
circumstances which precede, and eventually lead to the adoption of fire- 
engines, invariably reflect light on the manners and customs, the police and 
other municipal regulations of the times, as well as on many of the art6, 
particularly those connected with building. The following extracts from 
official records in the clerk's office, respecting their introduction into the 
city of New- York, will be found to illustrate some of the above remarks. 

It does not appear that either squirts or engines were used during the 
time the city remained in possession of its founders ; viz : from A. D. 
1614 to 1664. The volume of Dutch records preserved in the clerk's of- 
fice, to which we referred, page 299, contains several enactments relating 
to fires and fire wardens, but no mention is made of instruments for extin- 
guishing fires until 1648, when ladders, hooks and buckets were ordered 
from Holland. As these records have never been printed, a few extracts 
from the " Ordinances of the Director-General and the Council of the New 
Netherlands," will be acceptable to most readers. The first one is dated 
May 29, 1647 : it cannot, perhaps, be strictly considered as related to our 
subject, although it was designed to remove a fruitful source of fires, viz : 
inebriety. On the above date the Director-General, Petrus Stuyvesant, 
issued a proclamation, addressed to certain of the inhabitants " who are in 
the habit of getting drunk, of quarrelling, fighting, and of smiting each 
other on the Lord's day of rest, of which on the last Sunday, we our- 
selves witnessed the painful scenes." It appears from this and other 
edicts to the same effect, that the governor had considerable difficulty in 
keeping a portion of his people sober; and from following a practice which 
he denounces as the " dangerous, injurious, and damnable selling, giving 
out, and dealing out, wines, beers, and ardent spirits to the Indians or na- 
tives of this land." 

Another proclamation is more to our purpose. " Whereas it has come 
to the knowledge of his excellency, the Director-General of New Ne- 
therlands, Curacoa, &c. and of the Islands of the same, and their Excellen- 
cies the Councillors, that certain careless persons are in the habit of neg- 
lecting to clean their chimnies by sweeping, and paying no attention to their 
fires ; whereby lately fires have occurred in two houses ; and whereas the 
danger of fire is greater as the number of houses increases here in New- 
Amsterdam ; and whereas the greater number of them are built of wood 
and are covered with reeds, together with the fact that some of the houses 
have wooden chimnies, which are very dangerous : Therefore, by the 



340 'Extracts from old Dutch Records. [Book III 

prompt and excellent Director-General and their honours the Councillors, 
it has been deemed advisable and highly necessary to look into this mat- 
ter, and they do hereby ordain, enact, and interdict, that from this time 
forth no wooden or platted chimnies shall be permitted, . . . Those already 
standing shall be permitted to remain during the good pleasure of the 

jire wardens As often as any chimnies shall be discovered to be 

foul, the fire wardens aforesaid shall condemn them as foul, and the owner 
shall immediately, and without any gainsaying, pay the fine of three 
guilders, for each chimney thus condemned as foul ; to be appropriated to 
the maintenance of jire ladders, hooks, and buckets ; which shall be pro- 
vided and procured [from Holland] the first opportunity. And in case the 
house of any person shall be burned, or be on fire, either through his own 
negligence, or his own fire, he shall be mulcted in the penalty of twenty- 
Jive guilders, to be appropriated as aforesaid. Thus done, passed and pub- 
lished at Fort Amsterdam, this 23d day of January, 1648." 

This ordinance does not appear to have produced the desired effect, 
since a similar one was published in September of the same year. In Fe- 
bruary 1656 another was issued, by which the fire wardens were directed to 
establish such penalties for chimneys or houses taken fire "as shall bejbund 
among the customs of our Fatherland." At the close of the following year 
the use of squirts or engines does not appear to have occurred to the inha- 
bitants, a circumstance from which it may be inferred that such machines 
were at that time little used in Holland, and this also appears from an al- 
lusion to the practice of quenching fires there, in a proclamation prohibit- 
ing wooden chimneys, flag roofs, &c. " In all well regulated cities and 
corporations, it is customary that fire buckets, ladders and hooks, are in 
readiness at the corners of the streets, and in public houses, for the time of 
need. [Here is no mention of engines, although the instruments used in 
Holland are obviously alluded to.] The Director-General and the coun- 
cillors do ordain and authorize in these premises, the burgomasters of 
this city, either personally or by their treasurer, promptly to demand for 
every house, whether small or large, one beaver, or eight guilders in sea- 
want, according to the established price; for the purpose of ordering from 
the revenue of the same, by the first opportunity, from Fatherland, two 
hundred and, fifty leather fire buckets ; and out of the surplus, to have made 
some fire ladders and fire hooks: and in addition to this, once a year, to 
demand for every chimney, one guilder for the support and maintenance 
of the same. Thus done in the session of the director-general and coun- 
cillors, held in the fort of Amsterdam, in New Netherlands, this 15th day 
of December, A. D. 1657." 

After New Netherlands became a British province, similar ordinances 
continued to be enacted till the year 1731, when two of Newsham's en- 
gines were ordered from London. These were probably the first fire-en- 
gines used on this continent. The following extracts are from the mi- 
nutes of the common council. 

" At a common council held the 16th day of February 1676-7, in the 
28th year of Charles II. Ordered that all and every person and persons 
that have any of the city's ladders, buckets or hooks in their hands or 
custody, forthwith bring the same unto the mayor, as they will answer the 
contrary at their peril." The same date some wells were ordered to be 
made "for the public good of the city," among which was "one over 
against YoulefF Johnson's the butcher ; and another in Broadway against 
Mr. Vandike's." " At a common council held the 15th day of March 
1683, in the oGth of the reign of Charles II. Ordered that provision be 
made for hooks, ladders and buckets, to be kept in convenient places 



Chap. 8.] And from Minutes of the Common Council. 341 

within this city, for avoyding the peril of fire." No mention is here made of 
engines, nor in the next extract, wherein the want of instruments to quench 
fire is especially referred to. " Feb. 28, 1686 : Whereas great damages 
have been done by fire in this city, by reason there were not instruments 
to quench the same. It is ordered that every inhabitant within the city 
whose dwelling house has two chimnies shall provide one bucket for its 
use : and every house having more than two hearths, shall have two 
buckets." Every brewer was to provide six, and every baker three buck- 
ets, under a penalty of six shillings for every bucket ordered. " January, 
1689 : Ordered that there be appointed five Brent masters for the city of 
New- York, as follows : Peter Adolf, Derek Vanderbrink, Derek Ten 
Eyk, Jacob Borlen, Tobias Stoutenburgh ; and that five ladders be made 
to serve upon occasion of fire, with sufficient hooks thereto." 

November 16, 1695 : Every dwelling in the city was to be provided 
with one or more buckets by New- Year's day. The tenants were to 
provide them for the houses they occupied, and the cost to be deducted 
from the rent. Every brewer was again ordered to procure for his pre- 
mises six, and every baker three. Several buckets were lost, and the 
public crier was directed to give notice. These " orders" do not appear 
to have been implicitly obeyed, for they were frequently repeated, and 
in November 1703, a penalty was attached for noncompliance. " Octo- 
ber 1, 1706 : Ordered that Alderman Vanderburgh do provide for the 
public use of this city, eight ladders and two fire hooks, and poles of such 
length and dimensions as he shall judge to be convenient, to be used in 
case of fire." November 20, 1716, a committee was appointed " to pro- 
vide a sufficient number of ladders and hooks for the public use of this 
city in case of fire." In November 1730, fire-engines are first men- 
tioned. On the 18th of that month among other provisions enacted for 
the prevention and extinguishment of fires, one is in the following words : 
" And be it ordained by the authority aforesaid, that forthwith provision 
be made for hooks, ladders and buckets, and fire-engines, to be kept in 
convenient places within the city for avoiding the peril of fire." At the 
same time the inhabitants were again directed to provide and keep buckets 
in their houses. It does not appear that any active measures to procure 
the engines were taken till the next year, for under the date of May 6, 
1731, the common council " Resolved that this corporation do with all 
convenient speed procure two complete fire-engines, tcith suction and all 
materials thereunto belonging, for the public service: that the sizes thereof 
be the fourth and sixth sizes of Mr. Neivsham' 's fire-engines : and that Mr. 
Mayor, Alderman Cruger, Alderman Rutgers and Alderman Roosevelt, 
or any three of them, be a committee to agree with some proper merchant 
or merchants to send to London for the same by the first conveyance, 
and report upon what terms the said fire-engines, &c. will be delivered to 
this corporation." 

On the 12th of June the committee reported that the engines could be 
imported at an advance of 120 per cent on the invoice ; and they were 
ordered accordingly. They seem to have arrived about the 1st of De- 
cember, for on that day, a room in the City Hall was ordered to be fitted up 
" for securing the fire-engines." On the 14t7i of December a committee 
of two was appointed "to have the fire-engines cleaned and the leathers 
oiled and put into boxes, that the same may be fit for immediate use." 
January 2d, 1732. The mayor and four members of the court were au- 
thorized to employ persons to put the fire-engines in good order, and also 
to agree with proper persons to look after and take care of the same. It 
appears that Anthony Lamb was the first superintendent of fire-engines, 



342 Fire-Engines in America [Book III 

for on the 2ith of January 1735, the mayor was ordered " to issue his war- 
rant to the treasurer to pay Mr. Anthony Lamb, overseer of the fire-engines, 
or order, the sum of three pounds, current money of this colony, in full 
of one quarter of a year's salary, due and ending the first instant." On 
the same date a committee was appointed to employ workmen " to put 
them in good repair, and that they have full power to agree with any 
person or persons by the year, to keep the same in such good plight, re- 
pair and condition, and to play the same as often as there shall be occasion 
upon any emergency." 

April 15, 1736. " A convenient house [was ordered] to be made conti- 
guous to the watch-house in the Broad street for securing and well keeping 
the fire-engines of the city." This seems to have been the first engine 
house. May 1, 1736. Jacobus Turk, a gunsmith, was appointed to take 
charge of the fire-engines and to keep them in repair at his own cost, for 
a salary of ten pounds current money. Mr. Turk undertook during the 
next year to make an engine, for May 15, 1737, the common council or- 
dered the sum of ten pounds to be advanced " to the said Jacobus Turk, 
to enable him to go on with finishing a small fire-engine he is making for 
an experiment :" probably the first made in America. 

November 4, 1737. The common council drew up a petition to the le- 
gislature to enable the corporation " to appoint four-and-twenty able bo- 
died men, inhabitants within this city, who shall be called the firemen of this 
city, to work and play the fire-engines within the same, upon all occasions 
and emergencies, when they shall be thereunto required by the overseer 
of the said engines, or the magistrates of the said city : and that the said 
firemen as a recompense and reward for that service, may by the same 
law be excused and exempted from being elected and serving in the office 
of a constable, or being enlisted, or doing any duty in the militia regiment, 
troop, or companies, in the said city, or doing any duty in any of the said 
offices during their continuance as firemen aforesaid." This law was 
passed by the assembly in September following, and the duty of firemen de- 
fined. The next notice of engines occurs ten years afterwards, in March 
1748, when the corporation " ordered' that one of the fire-engines of this 
city, of the second size, be removed to Montgomery's Ward of this city, 
near Mr. Hardenbrooks ; and that a shed be built thereabouts at the charge 
of this corporation for the securing and keeping the same." By this it 
appears that several engines besides the two original ones were then in 
use. The one just named was a different size (much smaller) than those 
first ordered. It is uncertain whether the additional ones were made by 
Mr. Turk, but probably not, since both large and small ones were ordered 
from London for several years after this date. From the following ex- 
tract we find that several of the large fire-engines (the sixth size of New- 
sham) belonged to the city. February 28, 174.9, "Ordered that Major 
Vanhousand and Mr. Provost do take care to get a sufficient house built 
for one of the large fire-engines, to be kept in some part of Hanover square 
at the expense of this corporation, and that there be a convenience made 
therein for hanging fifty buckets : and also ordered that there be one hun- 
dred new fire buckets made for the use of this corporation with all con- 
venient speed." 

May 8, 1752. " Ordered that Jacob Turk have liberty to purchase six 
small speaking trumpets for the use of this corporation," i. e. for the pur- 
pose of giving directions to firemen during conflagrations. June 20, 1758. 
" One large fire-engine, one small do. and two hand do." were ordered 
to be procured from London. July 24, 1761. Mr. Turk, after superin- 
tending the engines for twenty-five years, was superseded by Jacobus 



Chap. 8.] Before the War of Independence. 343 

Stoutenburgh, who was directed to take charge of them at a salary of 
thirty pounds ; and " the late overseer, Mr. Jacobus Turk, [was ordered 
to] deliver up to the said Jacobus Stoutenburgh, the said several fire-en- 
gines." November 19, 1762. The firemen were directed to wear Jeather 
caps when on duty. May 7, 1772. An engine was ordered to be pro- 
vided for the Out ward. July 10, 1772. "Alderman Gautier laid before 
this board an account of the cost of two fire-engines belonging to Thomas 
Tillier : and Alderman Gautier is requested to purchase the same." Sep- 
tember 9, 1772. A committee was authorized "to purchase one other fire- 
engine o£ David Hunt." The three engines last named were probably 
from England, for at the time these machines were in the list of ordinary 
imported manufactures. 

It is not impossible that some engines were made in Massachusettsabout 
the time of the Revolutionary war. In October 1767, the people of Bos- 
ton, irritated by the exactions and disgusted with the parasites of mo- 
narchy, determined in a town meeting to cease importing from the 31st of 
December following, numerous articles of British manufacture, among 
which were enumerated anchors, nails, pewter-ware, clothing, hats, car- 
riages, cordage, furniture, and Jire-engines. And in March 1768, the As- 
sembly resolved, " that this house will, by all prudent means, endeavour 
to discountenance the use of foreign superfluities, and to encourage the 
manufactures of this province ;" hence it is reasonable to suppose that en- 
gines either had been, or then could be made in the province ; otherwise 
it is not likely that their importation would have been denounced. As 
an article of trade they were, from the limited number required, insignifi- 
cant — they had no connection with luxury ; and so far from being " su- 
perfluities," they were necessary to protect the property of the people 
from destruction — they would therefore be among the last things that a 
people would cease to import while unable to make them. 

It was not till several years after the close of the struggle for indepen- 
dence that fire-engines were made in this and some other cities. They 
have, however, long been made here and in Philadeljmia, Boston, &c. 
Small engines were formerly used, but they have gradually disappeared, 
the manufacturers confining themselves principally to the largest. The use 
of buckets has also been discontinued on account of the extensive applica- 
tion of hose. Village engines are sometimes constructed with single cy- 
linders and double acting, but being more liable to derangement, they are 
not extensively used. Rotary engines are also made in some parts of 
New-England, on the principle of Bramah and Dickenson's pumps, (No. 
138.) As ordinary fire-engines are merely forcing pumps, arranged in 
carriages and furnished with flexible pipes ; it is not to be supposed that 
any radical improvement upon them can be effected. The pump itself 
is, perhaps, not capable of any material change for the better; and it is at 
present essentially the same as when used by Ctesibius and Heron in 
Egypt, twenty centuries ago: hence fire-engines, since hose pipes and air 
chambers were introduced, have differed from each other chiefly in the 
carriages and in the arrangement and dimensions of the pumps — as the 
position of the cylinders, modes of working the pistons, bore and direction 
of the passages for the water, &c. In these respects there is not much 
difference between European and American engines; nor in the varieties 
of the latter. Those made in Philadelphia rather resemble French and 
German engines, in working the pumps at the ends of the carriages, and 
without the sectors and chains ; while New- York engines are precisely 
the same as Newsham's, both in the arrangement of the pumps and mode 
of working them, with the exception of treddles, which are not used. 



344 



Philadelphia Fire- Engine. 



[Book III. 



No. 153 represents an external view of a Philadelphia engine : the 
pumps and air vessel are arranged as in No. 150, but the piston rods are 
connected directly to the bent lever, which is moved by a double set of 
handles or staves. A number of men stand upon each end of the cistern and 
work the engine by the staves nearest to them, while others on the ground 
apply their strength to the staves at the extremities of the lever. The 
staves turn upon studs at the centre of the cross bars, and when put in 
operation, fall into clasps that retain them in their places. Provision 
is made to convey the stream either from the lower or from the upper 
part of the air chamber. Hose companies supply the engines with water. 
The firemen, as in all American cities, are volunteers, and generally con- 
sist of young tradesmen and merchants' clerks, &c. They are exempt 
from militia and jury duty. Each member pays a certain sum on his 
admission, and a small annual subscription. A fine is also imposed upon 
any one appearing on duty without his appropriate dress (see figure in the 
cut) as well for being absent. A generous spirit of rivalry exists among 
the different companies, which induces them to keep their engines in a 
high state of working order. 




No. 153. External Viow of a Philadelphia Fire-engine. 

No. 154 exhibits a New-York engine. The pump cylinders are ar- 
ranged and worked precisely as shown in the section No. 150. They 
are six and a half inches diameter, and the pistons have a stroke of nine 
inches. Previous to the formation of hose companies, each engine was 
provided with a reel of hose ; this, when not in use, was covered by a 
case of varnished cloth or leather. Most of the engines still have reels, 
which are carried as shown in the cut. The stream of water is invariably 
taken from the top of the air chambers, which resemble the one at No. 150. 
This practice is bad, because in most cases that part of the hose between 
the goose-neck and the fire descends to the ground, and hence the water 
in the pipe is unnecessarily diverted from its course and a corresponding 
diminution of effect is the result. In all cases the hose had better be con- 
nected to the bottom of the air chamber, or to its side near the bottom, 
as in Nos. 148, 152, 155. Very long chambers (as the one in No. 150) 



Chap. 8.] 



New- York Fire-Engine. 



345 



retard the issue of the liquid more than others which discharge it from 
the top, because the water has to descend in them nearly perpendicu- 
larly to enter the orifice of the pipe, and its direction is then precisely 
reversed, for it has to rise perpendicularly in ">rder to escape. 




No. 154. New-York City Fire-engine. 

In exterior decoration American engines are probably unrivaled : the 
firemen take pride in ornamenting their respective machines, and hence 
most of them are finished in the most superb and expensive manner. The 
whole of the iron work, except the tire of the wheels, is frequently plated 
with silver ; every part formed of brass is brought to the highest polish ; 
and while all the wood work, including the wheels, is elegantly painted 
and gilded, the backs, fronts, and panels of the case that encloses the 
air chamber and pumps, are enriched with historical and emblematical 
paintings and carved work, by the first artists. 

A new organization of the fire department of New-York has long been 
in contemplation, and the project of a law to that effect, is at this time 
under the consideration of the legislature of the state, and of the corpo- 
ration of the city. 

The most valuable contribution of American mechanicians to the means 
of extinguishing fires is the riveted hose, invented by Sellers and Pennock 
of Philadelphia. It is too well known both here and in Europe to re- 
quire particular description. No modern apparatus is complete without it. 

The Mechanics' Institute of New- York offered a gold medal (in January 
1840) for the best plan of a Steam fire-engine. The publication of the 
notice was very limited, and but two or three plans were sent in. Of 
these, one by Mr. Ericsson, a European engineer now in this country, re- 
ceived the prize. No. 155 represents a view of the engine. No. 156 a 
longitudinal section of the boiler, steam engine, pump, air vessel and blow- 
ing apparatus. No. 157, plan. No. 158, a transverse section of the boiler 
through the furnace and steam chamber. No. 159, the lever or handle 
for working the blowing apparatus by hand. The following is the inven- 
tor's description, in which the same letters of reference denote the same 
parts in all the figures. 

44 



346 



Steam Fire-Engine. 



[Book III, 



" A the double acting force pump, cast of gun metal, firmly secured to the 
carriage frame by four strong brackets cast on its sides, a, #, Suction 
valves, a', a' ', Suction passages leading to the cylinder, a", Chamber 
containing the suction valves, and to which chamber are connected suction 
pipes a"', a"' ', to which the hose is attached by screws in the usual man- 
ner, and closed by the ordinary screw cap. The delivering valves and 
passages at the top of the cylinder are similar to those just mentioned. 




B the air vessel, of a globular form, made of copper, b b delivery 
pipes, to which the pressure hose is attached : when only one jet is re- 
quired, the opposite pipe may be closed by a screw cap, as usual. The 
piston or bucket of the force pump to be provided with double leather 
packing : [cupped leathers] the piston rod to be made of copper. 



Chap. 8.] 



Steam Fire-Engine. 



347 



" C the boiler, constructed on the principle of the ordinary locomotive 
boiler, and containing 27 tubes of 1 J inch diameter. The top of the steam- 
chamber and the horizontal part of the boiler should be covered with wood, 

prevent the radiation of heat, c the fire door, c' the ash pan. • 




c" a box attached to end of boiler, inclosing the exit of the tubes. The 
hot air from the tubes received by this box is passed off through smoke 
pipe d" , which is carried through D D, making a half spiral turn round 
the air vessel in the form of a serpent, c 4 , iron brackets riveted to the 
boiler, and bolted to the carriage frame, c 5 , a wrought iron stay, also 
bolted to the carriage frame, for supporting the horizontal part of the boiler. 



348 Steam Fire-Engine, [Book III 

" E, a cylindrical box attached to the top of the steam chamber, contain- 
ing a conical steam valve e, and also safety valve e' . e" screw with 
handle connected to the steam valve, for admitting or shutting off the steam. 
e'" induction pipe, for conveying the steam to 

F, the steam cylinder, provided with steam passages and slide valve of 
the usual construction, and secured to the carriage frame in the same man- 
ner as the force pump, f Eduction pipe, for carrying off the steam into the 
atmosphere, f Piston, provided with metallic packing, on Barton's 
plan, f", Piston rod of steel, attached to the piston rod of the force 
pump by means of 

G. a crosshead of wrought iron, into which both piston rods are inserted 
and secured by keys, g, Tappet rod attached to the crosshead, for mov- 
ing the slide valve of the steam cylinder by means of nuts g' y g' , which 
may be placed at any position on the tappet rod. 

H. Spindle of wrought iron, working in two bearings attached to the 
cover of the steam cylinder, the one end thereof having fixed to it, h 
a lever, moved or struck ultimately by the nuts g', g' . h' a lever, fixed to 
the middle part of the spindle H, for moving the steam valve rod. 

I. Force pump for supplying the boiler, constructed with spindle 
valves on the ordinary plan ; the suction pipe thereof to communicate 
with the valve chamber of the water cylinder, and the delivering pipe to 
be connected to the horizontal part of the boiler, i, Plunger of force pump, 
to be made of gun metal or copper, and attached to the crosshead G. 

J. Blowing apparatus, consisting of a square wooden box, with pan- 
eled sides, in which is made to work a square piston j, made of wood, 
joined to the sides of said box by leather, j', Circular holes or openings 
through the sides, for admitting atmospheric air into the box ; these holes 
being covered on the inside by pieces of leather or India rubber cloth to 
act as valves. j /f , are similar holes through the top of the box, for passing 
off the air at each stroke of the piston, into 

K. Receiver or regulator, which has a movable top k, made of wood, 
joined by leather to the upper part of the box ; a thin sheet of lead to be 
attached thereto, for keeping up a certain compression of air in the regu 
lator. W , Box or passage made of sheet iron, attached to the blowing 
apparatus, and having an open communication with the regulator at k" : 
to this passage is connected a conducting pipe, as marked by dotted lines 
in No. 156, for conveying the air from the receiver into the ash pan, under 
the furnace of the boiler at 1c" 1 ; this conducting pipe passes along the in- 
side of the carriage frame on either side. 

L, L. Two parallel iron rods, t( which the piston of the blowing ap- 
paratus is attached : these rods work through guide brasses I, Z, and they 
may be attached to the crosshead G, by keys at V , V . The holes at the 
ends of the crosshead for admitting these rods are sufficiently large to al- 
low a free movement whenever it is desirable to work the blowing appa- 
ratus independently of the engine. 

M. Spindle of wrought iron, placed transversely, and working in two 
bearings fixed under the carriage frame : to this spindle are fixed two 
crank levers m, m, which by means of two connecting rods m! m', give 
motion to the piston rods L, L, by inserting the hooks m", m" , into the 
eyes at the ends of the said piston rods. 

N. Crank lever, fixed at the end of spindle M, which by means of 

O. Crank pin, fixed in the carriage wheel, and also 

P. Connecting rod, will communicate motion to the blowing appara- 
tus, whenever the carriage is in motion, and the above parts duly con- 
nected. 



Chap. 8.] Fire Escapes. 349 

" A pin n is fixed in lever N, placed at such distance from the centre of 
spindle M, that it will fit the hole n' of the lever shown in No. 159, whilst 
n" receives the end of the spindle M. Whenever the blowing apparatus 
is to be worked by the engine or by manual force, the connecting rod P 
should be detached by means of the lock at p. The carriage frame should 
be made of oak, and plated with iron all over the outside and top ; the 
top plate to have small recesses, to meet the brackets of the cylinders, as 
shown in the drawing. The lock of the carriage, axles, and springs to be 
made as usual, only differing by having the large springs suspended below 
the axle. The carriage wheels to be constructed on the suspension prin- 
ciple ; spokes and rim to be made of wrought iron, and very light. 

The principal object of a steam fire-engine being that of not depending 
on the power or diligence of a large number of men, one or two horses 
should always be kept in an adjoining stable for its transportation. The 
fire grate and flues should be kept very clean, with dry shavings, wood and 
coke, carefully laid in the furnace ready for ignition ; and a torch should 
always be at hand to ignite the fuel at a moment's notice. To this fire- 
engine establishment the word of fire should be given, without interme- 
diate orders : the horses being put to, the rod attached connecting the car- 
riage wheel to the bellows, and the fuel ignited, the engine may on all or- 
dinary occasions be at its destination, and in full operation in ten minutes." 

Attempts to supersede fire-engines were formerly common. Zachary 
Greyl is said to be the first who, in modern times, devised a substitute. 
This consisted of a close wooden vessel or barrel, containing a considera- 
ble quantity of water, and in the centre a small iron or tin case full of gun- 
powder: from this case a tube was continued through the side or head of 
the barrel, and was filled with a composition that readily ignited. When 
a room was on fire, one of these machines was thrown or conveyed into 
it, and the powder exploding dispersed the water in the outer case in 
every direction, and instantly extinguished the flames although raging 
with violence a moment before. In 1723, Godfrey, an English chemist, 
copied this device, and impregnated the water with an " antiphlogistic" 
substance. He named his machines "water bombs." In the year 1734, 
the States of Sweden offered a premium of twenty thousand crowns for the 
best invention of stopping the progress of fires; upon which M. Fuches, a 
German chemist, introduced an apparatus of the same kind. Similar de- 
vices have been brought forward in more recent days ; but after making 
a noise for a time, they have passed into oblivion. (See London Maga- 
zine for 1760 and 1761.) 

Among the devices of modern times for securing buildings from fire, may 
be mentioned the plan of Dr. Hales, of covering the floors with a layer 
of earth ; and that adopted by Harley in 1775, of nailing over joists, floors, 
stairs, partitions, &c. sheet iron or tin plate. To increase the effect of 
fire-engines, the author of this work devised in 1817, and put in practice 
at Paterson, New Jersey, in 1820, the plan of fixing perforated copper 
pipes over or along the ceilings of each floor of a factory or other build 
ings, and connecting them with others on the outside, or at a short dis 
tance from the walls, so that the hose of a fire-engine could be rea 
dily united by screws; but the plan had been previously developed by Sir 
W. Congreve. It has recently been brought before the public as a new 
invention. 

Of the numerous Fire Escapes that have been brought forward in modern 
times, the greater part are such as were employed by the ancients to scale 
walls and to enter fortresses, &c. in times of war. It is indeed obvious 



350 Couvre Feu. [Book III. 

that the same devices by which persons entered buildings, would also an- 
swer the purpose of escaping from them : and as the utmost ingenuity of 
the ancients was exercised in devising means to accomplish the one, it was 
exceedingly natural that modern inventors should hit upon similar contri- 
vances to effect the other. In the cuts to the old German translation of 
Vegetius, to which we have so often referred, there are ladders of rope 
and leather, in great variety, with hooks at the ends which when thrown 
by hand or an engine, were designed to catch hold of the corners and tops 
of the walls or windows — folding ladders of wood and metal, some con- 
sisting of numerous pieces screwed into each other by the person ascend- 
ing, till he reached the required elevation ; others with rollers at their 
upper ends to facilitate their elevation by rearing them against the front 
of the walls — baskets or chests containing several persons raised perpen- 
dicularly on a movable frame by means of a screw below, that pushed 
out several hollow frames or tubes contained within each other, like those 
of a telescope, whose united length reached to the top of the place at- 
tacked — sometimes the men were elevated in a basket suspended at 
the long end of a lever or swape. Several combinations of the lazy tongs, 
or jointed parallel bars are also figured — one of these moved on a car- 
riage raised a large box containing soldiers, and is identical with a fire 
escape described in volume xxxi of the Transactions of the London So- 
ciety of Arts. 

Anciently the authors of accidental fires were punished in proportion 
to the degree of negligence that occasioned them ; and they were com- 
pelled to repair to the extent of their means, the damage done to their 
neighbors. A law of this kind was instituted by Moses, probably iis 
imitation of a similar one in force among the Egyptians. Other preven- 
tive measures consisted in the establishment of watchmen, whose duty it 
was to arrest thieves and incendiaries, and to give alarm in case of fire. 
From the earliest days, those who designedly fired buildings were put to 
death. A very ancient custom which related to the prevention of fires, 
is still partially kept up in Europe, although the design of its institution 
is almost forgotten, viz : the ringing of town bells about eight o'clock in 
the evening, as a signal for the inhabitants to put out their lights, rake 
together the fire on their hearths, and cover it with an instrument named 
a curfew ; a corruption of couvre feu, and hence the evening peal became 
known as "the curfew bell." It has been supposed that the custom origi- 
nated with William the Conqueror, but it prevailed over Europe long be- 
fore his time, and was a very beneficial one, not only in constantly remind- 
ing the people to guard against fire, but indicating to them the usual time 
of retiring to rest ; for neither clocks nor watches were then known, and 
in the absence of the sun they had no device for measuring time. Alfred 
the Great, who measured time by candles,* ordered the inhabitants of 
Oxford to cover their fires on the ringing of the bell at carfax every night. 
The instrument was made of iron or copper. Its general form may be 
understood by supposing a common cauldron turned upside down and 
divided perpendicularly through the centre; one half being furnished with 
a handle riveted to it would be a couvre feu. When used it was placed 
over the ashes with the open side close to the back of the hearth. (See 
Diet. Trevoux: Hone's Every Day Book, vol. i. 243, and Shakespeare's 
Romeo and Juliet, Act iv, scene 4.) 

In the thirteenth year of Edward I. (A. D. 1285,) an act was passed 

a In Shakespeare's play of Richard III. act v. scene 3, there is a reference under the 
name of a watch to these candles. They were marked in sections, each of which was a cer- 
tain time in burning, and thus measured the hours during the night or cloudy weather. 



Chap. 8.] Ancient Laws respecti?ig Fires. 351 

against incendiaries, and night watchmen were ordered to be appointed 
in every town and city. In 1429 another act declared, " If any threaten 
by casting bills to burn a house, if money be not laid in a certain place,^ 
and after do burn the house, such burning shall be adjudged high trea- 
son." Beckman says that regulations respecting fires were instituted in 
Frankfort in 1460. In 1468 straw thatch was forbidden, and in 1474 
shingle roofs were prohibited. The first general order respecting fires in 
Saxony are dated 1521, those for Dresden in 1529, and there is one res- 
pecting buildings in Augsburg, dated 1447. The following preamble to an 
act passed in the 37th year of Henry VIII. by which those found guilty of 
the crimes enumerated, were to suffer "the pains of death," is interesting in 
more respects than one. " Where divers and sundry malicious and envi- 
ous persons, being men of evil perverse dispositions, and seduced by the 
instigation of the devil, and minding the hurt, undoing and impoverish- 
ment of divers of the kings true and faithful subjects, as enemies to the 
commonwealth of this realm, and as no true and obedient subjects unto 
the kings majesty, of their malicious and wicked minds, have of late in- 
vented and practised a new damnable kind of vice, displeasure and 
damnifying of the kings true subjects .and the commonwealth of this 
realm, as in secret burning of frames of timber, prepared and made by the 
owners thereof, ready to be set up and edified for houses : cutting out of 
heads and dams of pools, motes, stews and several waters : cutting of 
conduit-heads, or conduit-pipes : burning of wains and carts loaden with 
coals or other goods : burning of heaps of wood, cut, felled and prepared 
for making coals : cutting out of beasts tongues : cutting off the ears of 
the kings subjects : barking of apple trees, pear trees, and other fruit 
trees ; and divers other like kinds of miserable offences, to the great dis- 
pleasure of Almighty God and of the kings majesty," &c. (Statutes at 
large.) 

The crime of arson was rife in old Rome, and it is singular that the 
mode of punishing those found guilty of it, is among the numerous ancient 
customs that have been retained by Roman Catholics in their religious 
institutions. The tunica molesta of the Romans was a garment made of 
paper, flax, or tow, and smeared with pitch, bitumen or wax, in which 
incendiaries were burnt ; and hence arose the peculiar dress worn by the 
victims in those horrible, those demoniacal " Acts of faith !" the Auto da 
Fe, of Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese inquisitions, (to which the scenes 
in Smithfield and other parts of England may be added,) acts, in which 
the order of justice was completely reversed — the sufferers being the inno- 
cents, and the court and judges the real criminals. 



852 Pressure Engines. [Book III. 



CHAPTER IX. 



Pressure engines: Of limited application — Are modifications of gaining and losing buckets and 
pumps — Two kinds of pressure engines— Piston pressure engine described by Fludd — Pressure engine 
fromBelidor — Another by Westgarth — Motive pressure engines — These exhibit a novel mode of employ- 
ing water as a motive agent — Variety of applications of a piston and cylinder — Causes of the ancients 
being ignorant of the steam engine — Secret of making improvements in the arts — Fulton, Eli Whitney 
and Arkwright — Pressure engines might have been anticipated, and valuable lessons in Science may be 
derived from a disordered pump — Archimedes — Heron's Fountain — Portable ones recommended in 
FJowerGardens and Drawing-rooms, in hot weather — Their invention gave rise to a new class of hydrau- 
lic engines — Pressure engine at Chemnitz — Another modification of Heron's fountain — Spiral pump 
ofWirtz. 

Pressure engines, named by the French Machines a colonne d'eau, 
form an interesting variety of hydraulic devices belonging to the present 
division of the subject. They consist of working cylinders with valves 
and pistons, and resemble forcing pumps in their construction, but differ 
from them in their operation ; the pistons not being moved by any exter- 
nal force applied to them through cranks, levers, &c. but by the weight 
or pressure of a column of water acting directly upon or against them. 
Pressure engines are not very common, because they are only appli- 
cable to particular locations — such as afford a suitable supply of water for 
the motive column ; but wherever refuse, impure, salt or other water can 
be obtained from a sufficient elevation, such water may be used to raise a 
quantity of fresh by these machines. 

In some forms pressure engines appear rather complicated, but when 
analyzed, the principle of their action and mode of operation will be found 
extremely simple : — If two buckets, partly filled with water, be suspend- 
ed and balanced at the ends of a scale beam, and a stream be directed into 
one of them, that one will preponderate, and consequently the other with 
its contents will be raised, and to a height equal to the descent of the 
former; but when it is required to raise water in this manner to an eleva- 
tion that exceeds the distance through which the descending vessel can 
fall ; then the capacity of the latter is enlarged, and it is suspended nearer 
to the fulcrum or centre on which the beam turns, as in the gaining and 
losing bucket, page 66 : — It is virtually the same principle that is em- 
ployed in pressure engines ; the difference is principally in the manner of 
performing the operation. Instead of vessels suspended as above, two 
solid pistons, moving in cylinders, are attached by rods or chains to the 
ends of a beam, or to the ends of a cord passed over a pulley, so that the 
pressure of a longer or heavier column of water resting upon one piston 
forces it down, and thereby raises the other and with it the lighter or 
shorter column reposing upon it. 

By referring to the 16th illustration on page 64, it will be apparent that 
if a cylinder extended from B to the top of the cistern Z, and a hollow 
piston like the upper box of an atmospheric pump fitted to work in it 
were substituted for the bucket B, the effect produced would be much 
the same as with the two buckets, for the same quantity of water could be 
raised through the cylinder into the cistern Z, if allowance were made for 



Chap. 9.] Piston Pressure Engines. 353 

an increase of friction in the passage of the piston* And if another cylin- 
der extended from F to the bottom of the pit at O, and a solid piston fit- 
ted to it were used instead of the bucket A, with a contrivance at the bot- 
tom to allow the water to escape ; the apparatus would then be a pres- 
sure engine, although the principle of the motive part of it would not have 
been essentially changed. The cylinders in this example would perform 
the part of the buckets A B ; they might be considered as permanent or 
fixed, and very long buckets with movable bottoms, i. e. the pistons, which 
by ascending and descending in them received and discharged their con- 
tents. And as with the buckets A and B, the quantity of water expended 
from the motive or descending column would be proportionate to the di- 
mensions of the other and the elevation to which it was raised. Pressure 
engines may therefore be considered as a peculiar modification of the 
gaining and losing bucket machines, and as a combination of these with 
atmospheric and forcing pumps. They admit of various forms according 
to the location in which they are used and the objects to be accomplished 
by them. As liquids press equally in all directions, the cylinders may be 
placed in any position — horizontal, inclined, or vertical. Sometimes a 
pressure engine consists of a single cylinder with its appropriate pipes and 
valves like a double acting pump. The water to be raised enters at one 
side of the piston, and the motive column at the other ; but more com- 
monly a distinct cylinder and piston receives the impulse of the motive 
column, and in order to transmit it to the other, the two pistons are some 
times connected to the same rod as in No. 161 — at other times to oppo- 
site ends of a vibrating beam as in No. 162 — so that while one cylinder 
ard its apparatus act as a pump to raise water, the other is exclusively 
employed to work it. In this respect pressure engines may be considered 
rather as devices for communicating motion to machines proper for raising 
water, than as the latter, and they are sometimes used as propellers of 
other machines, but in whatever light they may be viewed, they are too 
interesting to be omitted. 

There are two kinds of pressure engines, but they differ from each 
other only in that part which receives the impulse of the motive column 
and transmits it to the other. In one, a solid body (a piston) is used for 
that purpose — in the other, a volume of air; but while a slight variation is 
thus caused in the two machines, the essential features, as well as the 
moving principle of both remains the same. Piston pressure engines are 
said to have been invented in the 18th century by M. Hoell, a German en- 
gineer. 1 ' It is more probable that he improved them only, for they cer- 
tainly were known much earlier : still it may be that he was ignorant of 
their previous use, and was led to their reinvention by his efforts to raise 
water from the Hungarian mines, in which he erected several pressure 
machines on the principle of Heron's fountain : the transition from these 
to the other was easy and natural, and may have resulted from his endea- 
vours to avoid a defect to which the former are subject, viz : the absorp- 
tion of the air by the water. About A. D. 1739, an improved form of 
pressure engines was devised, and introduced into some mines in France 
by Belidor, which he has described in his Architecture Hydraulique. Some 
writers have considered him the author of piston pressure engines, but 

a Pumps in certain locations are sometimes worked in that manner : the pistons or 
rods being loaded with weights sufficient to depress them, are raised by a bucket of 
water suspended at the opposite end of the beam, which when it reaches the bottom its 
contents are discharged, like the bucket A in No. 16, D in No. 17, or G in No. 162. 

b "Machine a colonne d'eau. German : Wasser Saulene. Machine ; inventee par 
M. Hoell, premier Machiniste d'L'Imperatrice." Arts et Metieres. L'Art d'exploiter 
Les Mines. Folio ed., Paris 1779, page 1449. Quarto ed. torn, xviii, p. 131. 

45 



354 



Pressure Engine from Fludd. 



[Book III. 



the honor of first inventing them is not, in fact, due to either Belidor or 
Hoell, as the following figure, No. 160, from a work published a century 
before either of those engineers nourished, will show. It is from Fludd's 
Naturce simia seu technica macrocosmi, 467. The character of this author 
as an astrologer and alchymist, and that of his works, which abound with 
absurdities, have probably caused the figure to be overlooked by modern 
writers on hydraulic and hydrostatic apparatus. Chemistry, however, is 
not the only science that is indebted to the shrewd but mistaken seekers 
of universal panaceas and of the philosopher's stone. 

The lower end of the pipe B D having a valve opening upwards, is 
inserted into the water to be raised. The pipe A receives the descend- 
ing or motive liquid column, which in this case was refuse or stagnant 

water, flowing from a source of 
sufficient altitude. This pipe 
may be at a considerable dis- 
tance from B D, and is so repre- 
sented in the original figure. It 
terminates below in a pit, drain, 
or low ground, whence the wa- 
ter discharged from it may es- 
cape. The end of it should be 
lower than that of D, and should 
be sealed or covered by water 
as represented, to prevent the 
entrance of air. A communica- 
tion is made between both these 
pipes by the horizontal one C. 
This last is connected to A at 
one of the apertures of a three- 
way cock, the upper and lower 
part of A being united to the 
other two. The other end of C 
terminates at the bottom of a 
working cylinder, which is closed 
at the top, by a short tube com- 
municating with B D, immediate- 
ly below a valve placed in the 
latter. In the cylinder, a piston 
(indicated by the dotted lines) 
is fitted. It is described as a 
wooden plug covered with lea- 
ther and loaded with lead, so 
as to make it descend in the cy- 

No. 160. Pressure Engine from Fludd. A. D. 1618. Under by its weight. 

To put this machine in operation, the cylinder and pipe D are first, filled 
with water through the funnel and small cock, after which the latter is 
closed. The plug of the three-way cock is then so arranged, that its two 
orifices coincide only with the upper part of A, and with C, when the 
pressure of the column in A will force up the piston, and with it all the 
water previously in the cylinder, which is thus compelled to ascend 
through the upper valve into the discharging pipe B. When this has 
taken place, the vessel G, suspended at one end of the rod that passes 
through the shank of the plug, has become filled with water, from the small 
jet issuing from A, and descending, turns the plug of the cock, so as to 
close the communication of the upper part of A with C, and open it be- 




PT 



Chap. 9.] 



Improved Pressure Engine from Belidor. 



355 



tween C and the lower part of A, upon which the piston descends in the 
cylinder and the foul water in C escapes through the lower end of A and 
runs to waste. By the time the piston reaches the bottom of the cylinder, 
the latter is refilled with water by the pressure of the atmosphere, as in a 
common pump ; and the contents of G have escaped through an orifice 
in its bottom, which is closed by a valve — this valve being opened by 
a projecting pin upon which the vessel descended, as shown in the figure. 
As soon as G is emptied, the weight on the opposite end of the rod prepon- 
derates, and turns the plug of the cock into its former position ; and thus 
the play of the machine is continued without intermission. The operation 
of filling the cylinder through the funnel, is required only at the first, like 
the priming of a new pump. 

The origin of this machine is uncertain. It does not appear to have 
been invented by Fludd himself, but is inserted among others, which he 
copied from older authors ; and such as he examined abroad. As he tra- 
veled in Germany and has described some of the hydraulic machines 
used in the mines there, (see one figured on page 219,) it is probable that 
he derived a knowledge of it in that country. It possesses considerable 
interest — it is self acting, and that by a very simple device — it shows an old 
application of the three-way cock — it exhibits the application of refuse or 
putrid water, to raise fresh, and in a way somewhat similar to one re- 
cently proposed — and it is the oldest piston pressure engine known. 

The next figure from Belidor, shows a great improvement on the last, 
so much so, that in some respects it may be considered a new machine. 

A, conveys the descending 
column from its source to the 
three-way cock F ; to one of 
the openings of which it is 
united. This cock is con- 
nected, at another opening, 
to the horizontal cylinder G, 
whose axis coincides with 
that of a smaller one D. Both 
cylinders are of the same 
length ; and their pistons are 
attached to a common rod, as 
represented. Two valves are 
placed in the ascending pipe 
B — one below, the other 
above its junction with the 
cylinder D. The horizontal 
pipe H connects B and D with the third opening of the cock. By turning 
the plug of this cock, a communication is opened alternately between each 
cylinder and the water in A. Thus when the water rushes into C, it 
drives the piston before it to the extremity of the cylinder, and conse- 
quently the water that was previously in J) is forced up the ascending 
pipe B ; then the communication between A and C is cut off, (by turn- 
ing the cock) and that between A and D is opened, when the pistons 
are moved back towards F by the pressure of the column against the 
smaller piston — the water previously in C escaping through an opening 
shown in front of the cock and runs to waste, while that which enters D 
is necessarily forced up B at the next stroke of the pistons. The cock 
was opened and closed by levers, connected to the middle of the piston 
rod, and was thus worked by the machine itself. By the air chamber, 
the discharge from B is rendered continuous. 




No. 161. Pressure Engine from Belidor. A. D. 1739. 



356 Westgarth's Pressure Engine. [Book III. 

Suppose the water in A has a perpendicular fall of thirty-four or thirty- 
five feet, and it were required to raise a portion of it to an elevation of 
seventy feet above F ; it will be apparent that if both pistons were of 
the same diameter, such an object could not be accomplished by this ma- 
chine — for both cylinders would virtually be but one — and so would the 
pistons ; and the pressure of the column on both sides of the latter would 
be equal. A column of water thirty-five feet high presses on the base that 
sustains it with a force of 151bs. on every superficial inch ; and one of 
seventy feet high, with a force of 301bs. on every inch — hence without re- 
garding the friction to be overcome, which arises from the rubbing of the 
pistons ; from the passage of the water through the pipes : and from the ne- 
cessary apparatus to render the machine self-acting — it is obvious in the case 
supposed that the area of the piston in C must be more than double that 
in D, or no water could be discharged through B. Thus in all cases, the 
relative proportion between the area of the pistons, or diameter of the cy- 
linders, must be determined by the difference between the perpendicular 
height of the two columns. When the descending one passes through a 
perpendicular space, greatly exceeding that of the ascending one, then 
the cylinder of the latter may be larger than that of the former : a smaller 
quantity of water in this case raising a larger one : it, however, descends 
like a small weight at the long end of a lever, through a greater space. 

In 1769 the London Society of Arts, awarded to Mr. Westgarth a pre- 
mium of fifty guineas, for his invention of a pressure engine. It is des- 
cribed by the celebrated Smeaton, in vol. v, of their Transactions, as " one 
of the greatest strokes of art in the hydraulic way, that has appeared since 
the invention of the fire [steam] engine." Several were erected by 
Mr. W. in 1765, to raise water from lead mines in the north of Eng- 
land. They were simple in their construction, and somewhat resembled 
the engines of Newcomen. They differed from those of Belidor in the 
position of the cylinder ; the introduction of a beam ; the substitution of 
cylindrical valves in the place of cocks ; and using the motive column to 
move the piston in one direction only. The cylinder of Westgarth's en- 
gine was placed in a vertical position, the piston rod of which was sus- 
pended by a chain from the arched end of a " walking" or vibrating beam ; 
while the other end of the latter, projected over the mouth of the mine or 
pit, and was connected (by a chain) to the rod of an atmospheric pump 
placed in the pit. This rod was loaded as in Newcomen's engine, so as 
to descend by its weight and thereby raise the piston of the pressure en- 
gine when the column of water was not acting on the latter. Thus, when 
the motive column of water was admitted into the cylinder, the piston 
was depressed, and the end of the beam also, to which it was connected ; 
consequently the pump rod and its sucker were raised, and with them 
water from the mine. Then as soon as the piston reached the bottom of 
the cylinder, the motive column was cut off, by closing a valve ; and a 
passage made for the escape of that within the cylinder, by opening 
another — upon which the loaded pump rod again preponderated — the 
valve to admit the column on the piston of the pressure engine was again 
opened, and the operation repeated as before. 

In another form these machines have been adopted, in favorable loca- 
tions, as first movers of machinery, and when thus used, they exhibit a 
very striking resemblance to high pressure steam-engines. Indeed, the 
elemental features of steam and pressure engines are the same, and the 
modes of employing the motive agents in both are identical — it is the dif- 
ferent properties of the agents that induces a slight variation in the ma- 
chines — one being an elastic fluid, the other a non-elastic liquid. In steam- 



Chap. 9.] 



Motive Pressure Engine. 



357 



engines a piston is alternately pushed up and down in its cylinder by 
steam ; and by means of the rod to which the piston is secured, motion is 
communicated to a crank and fly-wheel, and through these to the machi- 
nery to be propelled : it is the same with pressure engines when used to 
move other machines, except that instead of the elastic vapor of water, a 
column of that liquid drives the pistons to and fro, as will be perceived 
bv an examination of the following figure. 




No. 162. Motive Pressure Engine. 

E represents the lower part of the pipe which conveys the water down 
from its source into the air chamber C, from the lower part of which it 
passes through a short tube and stop cock mto the valve case, or "side 
pipe" D. This pipe is parallel with the working cylinder of the engine 

A, and rather longer : it communicates with A through two passages for 
the admission of the water to act upon both sides of the piston. The ends 
of D are closed by stuffing boxes, through which a rod in the direction of 
its axis is made to slide, and upon this rod are secured two plugs, shown 
in the cut, that fill the interior of the pipe like pistons, and as the rod is 
raised or lowered, alternately open and close the passages into the cylin- 
der. Suppose the position of the various parts of the engine as indicated 
in the figure, and the stop-cock in the short tube that connects the " side 
pipe" to the air vessel be opened, the water would then rush into the 
upper part of the cylinder A, as shown by the arrows, and by its statical 
pressure force down the piston ; while any water previously below the 
piston would escape through the lower passage into the side pipe (be- 
neath the plug) and run off to waste through the tube B, marked by dot- 
ted lines, and the circular orifices of which are also figured. When the 
piston has reached the bottom of the cylinder, the rod to which the plugs 
are attached is drawn down, so as to close the upper passage and open 
the lower one, upon which the water enters through the latter and 
drives up the piston as before, the previous contents of the cylinder being 
forced through the circular orifice in the upper part of the side pipe into 

B. In this manner the operation is continued and motion imparted to the 
beam, crank and fly-wheel. The apparatus for moving the rod that opens 



358 Pressure Engines. [Book III. 

and closes the passages into the cylinder is analogous to that of steam en- 
gines, being effected by an eccentric on the crank shaft. It is omitted 
in the cut, that the essential features of the machine might appear more 
conspicuous. 

It is obvious that engines of this kind may be employed to impart mo- 
tion to pumps or any other machinery. The intensity of the force trans- 
mitted by them depends upon the perpendicular height of the motive 
column and the area of the piston. The use of the air vessel is, as in the 
hydraulic ram and other machines, to break the force of the blow or con- 
cussion consequent on the sudden stoppage of the descending column by 
closing the passages. Wherever the waste pipe B can descend thirty- 
five or thirty-six feet, the engine may derive an additional power from the 
vacuum thus kept up behind the piston, as in low-pressure steam-engines. 
The application of this feature to pressure engines was included in an 
English patent granted to John Luddock in February 1799. (Repertory 
of Arts, vol. xi, page 73.) 

The invention of pressure engines brought to light a new mode of em- 
ploying water as a motive agent ; and also the means of applying it in 
locations where it could not otherwise be used. When water moves an 
under or overshot wheel, the machinery to be propelled must be placed 
in the immediate vicinity — hence saw, grist, and fulling mills, &c. are 
erected where the falling liquid flows ; and when steam is the moving 
force, the engines are located where the fluid is generated ; but with pres- 
sure engines it is different, for the motive agent may be taken to the ma- 
chine itself. In valleys or low lands, having no natural fall of water, but 
where that liquid can be conveyed in tubes from a sufficient elevation, (no 
matter how distant the source may be,) such water, by these machines, 
may be made to propel others. And by means of them the small lakes 
often found on mountains, and water drawn from the heads of falls and 
rapids, may furnish power for numerous operations in neighboring plains. 
When cities are supplied from elevated sources, an additional revenue 
might be derived from the force with which the liquid issues from the 
tubes : the occupant of a house into which a lateral pipe from the mains 
is conveyed, might connect the pipe to a pressure engine, and thereby 
impart motion to lathes, or printing presses ; raise and lower goods on dif- 
ferent stories ; press cotton, paper, books, &c. as by a steam-engine. But 
unlike the machine just named, a pressure engine is inexpensive, and sim- 
ple in its construction — it requires neither chimneys, furnaces, nor loads 
of fuel ; neither firemen nor engineers, nor is there any danger of explo- 
sions. It may be placed in the corner of a room, or be concealed under 
a counter or a table. It may be set in operation in a moment, by opening 
a cock, and the instant the work is done, it may be stopped by shutting 
the same, and thus prevent the least waste of power — and when the work 
is accomplished, the water can be used for all ordinary purposes as if just 
drawn from the mains, for the engine might be considered as merely a 
continuation of the lateral tube. 

Pressure engines afford another illustration of the variety of purposes 
to which a piston and cylinder may be applied. These were probably first 
used in piston bellows ; next in the syringe ; subsequently in pumps of 
every variety ; and then in pressure and steam-engines. The moving 
piston is the nucleus or elemental part that gives efficiency to them all; and 
the apparatus that surround it in some of them, are but its appendages. 
To what extent it is destined to be employed when steam becomes super- 
seded by other fluids, time only can reveal ; but if we may judge of the 
future by the past, this simple device will perform greater wonders in the 



Chap. 9.] • Discoveries in the Arts. 359 

world than it has yet accomplished. It is by it only that the energy of 
elastic fluids can be economically employed. 

Those ingenious men who first constructed a bellows, a syringe, or a 
pump, little thought that similar implements should become self-acting, and 
even be motive engines to drive others. What weary laborer at the 
pump in ancient Greece or Rome, ever dreamt, while indulging in 1 those 
reveries that the mind conjures up to divert attention from toil or pain, 
that a machine similar to the one upon which his strength was expended, 
should be devised to work without human aid : — and that a modification 
of it, excited by the vapor of a boiling cauldron, should exert a force 
compared with which the power of the Titans was impotence — a force 
that should drive fleets of gallies through a storm — hurl missiles like the 
balistEe — propel chariots " without horses" — polish a mirror — forge a 
hatchet, a tripod or a vase — and spin thread and weave it into veils, fine 
as those worn by the vestal virgins — and yet should never tire ! Could 
the imaginations of the depressed plebeians and slaves of antiquity have 
had a glimpse of such a machine, and had they been informed that it 
would in some future time, which the oracles had not revealed, be gene- 
rally employed — how vehemently would they have importuned the gods 
to send it in their days ! And why did they not have it ? Because the 
useful arts were neglected and their professors despised — while those 
professions the most destructive of human felicity were cultivated. WaT 
was accounted honorable, and hence nations were incessantly engaged in 
conflicts with each other — a military spirit pervaded the minds of the 
people, and it rewarded them by soaking every land with their blood. 

The history of machines composed of pistons and cylinders also illus- 
trates the process by which some simple inventions have become applied 
to purposes, foreign to those for which they were originally designed — 
each application opening the way for a different one. In this manner de- 
vices apparently insignificant have eventually become of the utmost value, 
and it is probable that there is no mechanical combination or device, how- 
ever useless it may now appear, but which will be thus brought into play. 
These machines also teach us how new discoveries are made in the arts, 
viz : by observing common results, and applying the principles or processes 
by which they are induced, to other objects or designs. Every mechani- 
cal movement and manufacture — an unsuccessful experiment — defects or 
derangements of ordinary machines, &c. are all practical demonstrations 
that indicate the means to produce analogous effects, or to avoid them. 
Fulton employed steam-engines to turn paddle wheels — Eli Whitney 
adopted circular saws as cotton gins ; and both became benefactors of 
their country — a poor barber in England, after exercising his ingenuity 
on the perpetual motion, applied some of his devices to cotton spinning, 
and not only became one of the most opulent of manufacturers, but secured 
a place in the biography of eminently useful men. 

Nearly all modern improvements and inventions have been brought 
about in a somewhat similar manner, and there are few but what might 
have been anticipated by attention to every-day facts. Suppose pressure 
engines had not yet been known : they might be developed by reflecting 
on a very common circumstance connected with ordinary pumps. "When 
one of these no longer retains water in the cylinder and trunk, it is neces- 
sary to -prime it, by pouring in a quantity sufficient to fill the space in 
which the sucker moves : this water resting upon the latter presses it down, 
and consequently raises the lever or pump handle, which again descends as 
soon as the water escapes below ; thus illustrating the principle by which 
pressure engines act — the lever being moved by the water instead of the 



360 Heron's Fountain. [Book III. 

water by it. How many ages have elapsed, and how many millions of 
people have witnessed this operation, without a useful idea having been 
derived from it ] And without any one thinking that valuable lessons in 
science might be learnt from a disordered pump, or from the irregular 
movements of a pump handle ] Those observing minds, however, that 
are constantly on the alert for facts — like bees incessantly on the wing for 
honey — would not now suffer even such an occurrence to pass unnoticed ; 
nor would they hesitate to consider those unpleasant knocks which 
hundreds of people (and the writer among them) have occasionally expe- 
rienced from the unexpected descent of a heavy pump handle on their 
persons, and in some instances more unpleasant ones from its sudden as- 
cent — as admonitions to turn the experiment to advantage. The simple 
rise of water which his body displaced in a bathing tub, was seized in a 
twinkling by the mathematician of Syracuse to solve a new and difficult 
problem ; yet the same thing had been previously witnessed for thousands 
of years, but no one ever thought of applying the result to any such 
purpose. 

It perhaps may be a question whether the machines already described 
in this chapter were known to the engineers of antiquity, but there is no 
room to doubt their acquaintance with another variety of pressure engines, 
since we have obtained a knowledge of them from the Spiritalia of Heron, 
whose name they still bear. It is obvious that a liquid may be forced out 
of a vessel by pressing into the latter any other substance, no matter what 
the nature of it may be, whether solid or fluid, liquid or aeriform : thus, 
the solid plunger or piston of a pump does not more effectually expel the 
contents of the cylinder in which it moves, than the elastic fluid in a soda 
fountain drives out the aerated water ; hence, if air be urged by the pres- 
sure of a liquid column, or by any other force, to occupy the interior of a 
vessel containing water, the liquid may be raised through a tube to an 
elevation equal to the force that moves it ; the air in this case performing 
the part of pistons in the pressure engines already described ; and its ef- 
fects are greater than can be produced by solid pistons, for the friction of 
these consumes a considerable portion of the motive force, so that a co- 
lumn of water raised by them can never equal the one that raises it ; 
whereas air, from its extreme mobility, receives and transmits the momen- 
tum of the motive column undiminished to the other. 

The fountain of Heron is the oldest pressure engine known, and in it a 
volume of air is used as a substitute for a piston. It is not certain that it 
was invented by him, for it may have been an old device in his time, 
and one which he thought worthy of preservation, or of being made more 
extensively known, and therefore inserted an account of it in his book. 
See No. 163. The two vessels A B, of any shape, are made air tight. 
The top of the upper one is formed into a dish or basin ; in the centre of 
which the jet pipe is inserted, its lower end extending to near the bottom 
of A : a pipe C, whose upper orifice is soldered to the basin extends 
down to near the bottom of the lower vessel, either passing through the 
top of B, as in the figure, or inserted at the side. Another pipe D is con- 
nected to the top of B, and continued to the upper part of A. This pipe 
conducts the air from B to A. Now suppose the vessel A filled with 
water, through an aperture made for the purpose, and which is then 
closed ; the object is to make this water ascend through the jet, and it is 
accomplished thus : — water is poured into the basin, and of course it runs 
down the pipe C into B ; and as it rises in the latter, the air within is ne- 
cessarily compressed, and having no way to escape but up the pipe D, it 
ascends into the upper part of A, where being pressed on the surface of 



Chap. 9.] 



Heron's Fountain. 



361 



the water, the latter is compelled to ascend through the jet pipe, as shown 
in the cut. The water thus forced out, falls back into the basin, and run- 
ning down C into B continues the play of the machine, until all the water 
in A is expended. The elevation to which water in A can 
be thus raised through a tube, will be equal to the perpen- 
dicular distance between the two orifices of C. Toper- 
sons who are ignorant of the construction of these foun- 
tains, the water in the basin appears to descend, and to 
rise again through the jet. Such is not the fact; were it so, 
this machine would be a perpetual motion, or something 
very like one. Some persons beguiled by the apparent 
possibility of inducing it to ascend, have attempted the so- 
lution of that problem by a similar apparatus. We may 
as well confess that in our youth we were of the number. 
The younger Pliny seems to have fallen into the same 
mistake respecting a fountain belonging to his country seat. 
Portable fountains of this kind might be adopted as ap- 
propriate appendages to flower gardens, and even drawing 
rooms. The pipes might be concealed within, or modeled 
into a handsome column, whose pedestal formed the lower 
vessel, while the upper end assumed the figure of a vase. 
Such an addition to the furniture of an apartment would 
be a useful acquisition at those seasons when the atmos- 
phere, glowing like the air of an oven, scorches our bodies 
during the day, and in the evening we gasp in vain for the 
cooling breeze : at such times a minute stream of water 
spouting and sparkling in a room would soon allay the 
heat and invigorate our drooping spirits — imparting the 
refreshing coolness of autumn amid the burning heats of 
summer ; and if the liquid were perfumed with attar of roses, 
or oil of lavender, we might realize the most innocent and 
delicious of oriental luxuries. The play of such a fountain 
might be continued for two or three hours at a time, for the size of the 
stream need hardly exceed that of a thread, and by a slight modification, 
the jet could be renewed as often as the upper vessel was emptied, by 
simply inverting the machine : or, the whole might be arranged without, 
except the ajutage and the vase in which the jet played. (See remarks 
on fountains in the fifth book.) 

This fountain has been named a toy, but it is by such toys that impor- 
tant discoveries have been made in every age. It is clearly no rude or 
imperfect device : not a first thought ; on the contrary, it bears the evi- 
dence of a matured machine, and of being the result of a familiar acquaint- 
ance with the principles upon which its action depends. Unlike older 
hydraulic machines, it requires no .distinct vessel within which to raise a 
a liquid ; nor does it resemble pumps, since neither cylinders, suckers, 
valves or levers are required, nor any external force to keep it in motion. 
Its invention may be considered as having opened a new era in the his- 
tory of machines for raising water, for it is susceptible of an almost endless 
variety of modifications, and of being applied to a great number of pur- 
poses. To understand this it is only necessary to bear in mind that the 
relative position of the two columns is immaterial : they may be a mile 
distant from each other, or they may be nearly together. The one that 
raises the other may be above, below, or on a level with the latter ; both 
may be conveyed in pipes along or under the surface of the ground, and 
in any direction : the only condition required is, that the perpendicular 

46 



W 



No. 163. Heron's 
Fountain. 



362 



Pressure Engine at Chemnitz. 



[Book III 



distance between the upper and lower orifices of the pipe in which the 
motive column flows, shall be equal to the force required to raise the other 
to the proposed elevation. 

A pressure engine on the principle of Heron's fountain, erected by M. 
Hoell in 1755, to raise water from one of the mines in Hungary, has long 
been celebrated. In the vicinity of one of the shafts at Chemnitz, there is 
a hill upon which is a spring of water, one hundred and forty feet above 
the mouth of the shaft. This spring furnishes more water than that which 
rises at the bottom of the mine, which is one hundred and four feet below 
the mouth of the shaft. The water in the mine is raised by means of that 
on the hill by an apparatus similar to the one figured in the annexed cut. 

A represents a strong copper vessel eight feet and a half high, five feet 
diameter, and two inches thick. A large cock marked 3 is inserted near 

the bottom, and a smaller one 2 near the top. 
From this vessel a pipe D, two inches in dia- 
meter, reaches down and is connected to 
the top of the vessel B at the bottom of the 
shaft. This vessel is smaller than the upper 
one, being six feet and a half high, four feet 
diameter, and two inches thick, and of the 
same material as the other. A pipe E, four 
inches diameter, rises from near the bottom 
of B to the surface of the ground, where it 
discharges the water. The pipe C conveys 
the water from the spring on the hill ; it is 
also four inches diameter, and descends to 
near the bottom of A. It is furnished with a 
cock 1. Water is admitted into B through a 
cock 4, or a valve opening inwards, which 
closes when B is filled. The vessel A is sup- 
posed to be empty, or rather filled with air, 
and its two cocks shut. The cock 1 is then 
opened, when the water rushing into A con- 
denses the air within it and the pipe D, 
and this air pressing on the water in B, 
forces it up the pipe E. As soon as it ceases 
to flow through E, the cock 1 is shut and 2 
and 3 are opened,, when the water in A is 
discharged at 3. The cock or valve at the 
bottom of B is opened, and the water entering 
drives the air up D into A where it escapes 
at 2. The operation is then repeated as before. 

If, when water ceases to run at E, the cock 2 be opened, both water 
and air rush out of it together, and with such violence that the liquid is, 
by the generation of cold consequent on the sudden expansion of the con- 
densed air, converted into hail or pellets of ice. This fact is generally 
shown to strangers, who are usually invited to hold their hats in front of the 
cock so as to receive the blast ; when the hail issues with such violence, 
as frequently to pierce the hats, like pistol bullets. This mode of pro- 
ducing ice was known to the marquis of Worcester, who refers to it in the 
eighteenth proposition of his Century of Inventions, relating to an " artifi- 
cial fountain, holding great quantity of water, and of force sufficient to 
make snow, ice, and thunder." Some additions to the machine at Chem- 




No. 164. Pressure Engine at 
Chemnitz. 



nitz, by which it might be 



rendered self-acting, 



were proposed in 1796. 



They consisted of small vessels suspended from levers that were secured 



Chap. 9.] 



Wirtz's Pump. 



363 



to the shanks of the cocks, which they opened and shut in the same man- 
ner as shown in No. 160. A similar contrivance may be seen in several 
old authors — it is in the Spiritalia: Decaus, Fludd, Moxon and Switzer 
have all given figures of it. The quantity of water raised from the shaft 
compared with that expended from the spring was as 42 to 100. 

By arranging a series of vessels above each other and connecting them 
by pipes as in No. 163, water may be raised to almost any height, in lo- 
cations that have the advantage of a small fall. The distance between 
the vessels not exceeding the perpendicular descent of the motive column, 
which last is made to transmit its force to each vessel in succession — forc- 
ing the contents of one into the next above, and so on. Such a machine 
is interesting as showing the extent to which the principle of Heron's 
fountain may be applied, but for practical purposes it is of little value. It 
is too complex (if made self-acting) and too expensive for common use ; 
and it is far inferior to the water ram. It was described by Dr. Darwin, 
in his Phytologia, to which modern writers generally refer, but it is an 
old affair. It is figured by Moxon in his "Mechanick Powers," Lon. 1696, 
and is mentioned by older authors. It is substantially the same as the 
double fountain of Heron, as found in the Spiritalia and the works of most 
writers on hydraulics. 

By far the most novel and interesting modification of Heron's fountain 
was devised in the year 1746 by H. A. Wirtz, a Swiss pewterer or tin- 
plate worker of Zurich. It is sometimes named a spiral pump, and was 
made to raise water for a dye house in the vicinity of that city. What the 
circumstances were that led Wirtz to its invention we are not informed — 
whether it was suggested by some incident, or was the result of reasoning 
alone. It is represented in the illustrations Nos. 165 and 166, the first 
being a section and the latter an external view. 




No. 165. Section of Wirtz's Pump. No. 166. View of Wirtz's Pump. 

Wirtz's machine consists either of a helical or a spiral pipe. As the 
former it is coiled round in one plane as A B C D E F in No. 165. As 
a spiral it is arranged round the circumference of a cone or cylinder, and 
then resembles the worm of a still. The interior end at G is united by a 
water tight joint to the ascending pipe H. See No. 166. The open end 



364 Wirtz's Pump. [Book III. 

of the coil is enlarged so as to form a scoop. When the machine, im- 
mersed in water as represented, is turned in the direction of the arrow, 
the water in the scoop, as the latter emerges, passes along the pipe driv- 
ing the air before it into G H, where it escapes. At the next revolution 
both air and water enter the scoop ; the water is driven along the tube as 
before, but is separated from the first portion by a column of air of nearly 
equal length. By continuing the motion of the machine another portion 
of water and another of air will be introduced. The body of water in each 
coil will have both its ends horizontal, and the included air will be of 
about its natural density ; but as the diameters of the coils diminish to- 
wards the centre, the column of water which occupied a semicircle in the 
outer coil, will occupy more and more of the inner ones as they approach 
the centre G, till there will be a certain coil, of which it will occupy a 
complete turn. Hence it will occupy more than the entire space within 
this coil, and consequently the water will run back over the top of the 
succeeding coil, into the right hand side of the next one and push the 
water within it backwards and raise the other end. As soon as the water 
rises in the pipe Gr H, the escape of air is prevented when the scoop 
takes in its next quantity of water. Here, then, are two columns of water 
acting against each other by hydrostatic pressure, and the intervening co- 
lumn of air. They must compress the air between them, and the water 
and air columns will now be unequal. This will have a general tendency 
to keep the whole water back and cause it to be higher on the left or ris- 
ing side of each coil, than on the other. The excess of height will be just 
such as produces the compression of the air between that and the preced- 
ing column of water. This will go on increasing as the water mounts in 
H. Now at whatever height the water in H may be, it is evident that 
the air in the small column next to it will always be compressed with the 
weight of the water in H — an equal force must therefore be exerted by 
the water in the coils to support the column in H. This force is the sum 
of all the differences between the elevation of the inner ends of the water 
in each coil above the outer ends ; and the height to which the water will 
rise in H will be just equal to this sum. Dr. Gregory observes that the 
principles on which the theory of this machine depends are confessedly 
intricate ; but when judiciously constructed, it is very powerful and effec- 
tive in its operation. It has not been ascertained whether the helical or 
spiral form is best. Some of these machines were erected in Florence in 
1778. In 1784, one was made at Archangelsky, that raised a hogshead of 
water in a minute to an elevation of seventy-four feet, and through a pipe 
seven hundred and sixty feet long. See Gregory's Mechanics, vol. ii. 

It perhaps may facilitate an understanding of this curious machine, by 
remarking that the pressure exerted by the column of water in one side of 
each coil is proportioned to its length, and that this pressure is transmit- 
ted, through the column of air between them, to that of the next: the com- 
bined force of both is then made to act, by the revolution of the tubes, 
upon the third column, and so on, till the accumulated force of them all 
is communicated to the water in H ; and hence the elevation to which 
water can be thus raised, can never exceed the sum of the altitudes of the 
liquid columns in the coils. 

END OF THE THIRD BOOK. 



BOOK IV. 



MACHINES FOR RAISING WATER, (CHIEFLY OF MODERN ORIGIN) 

INCLUDING EARLY APPLICATIONS OF STEAM FOR 

THAT PURPOSE. 



CHAP TER I. 

Devices of the lower animals — Some animals aware that force is increased by the space through 
which a body moves — Birds drop shell fish from great elevations to break the shells — Death of jEschylus 
— Combats between the males of sheep and goats— Military ram of the ancients — Water rams — Waves 
— Momentum acquired by running water — Examples — Whitehurst's machine — Hydraulic ram of Mont- 
golfier— ;" Canne hydraulique" and its modifications. 

Of the machines appropriated to the fourth division of this work, (see 
page 8,) centrifugal pumps and a few others have already been described. 
There remain to be noticed, the water ram, canne hydraulique, and de- 
vices for raising water by means of steam and other elastic fluids. 

If the various operations of the lower animals were investigated, a thou- 
sand devices that are practised by man would be met with, and probably 
a thousand more of which we yet know nothing. Even the means by which 
they defend themselves and secure their food or their prey, are calculated 
to impart useful information. Some live by stratagem, laying concealed 
till their unsuspecting victims approach within reach — others dig pitfalls 
to entrap them ; and others again fabricate nets to entangle them, and 
coat the threads with a glutinous substance resembling the birdlime of the 
fowler. Some species distill poison and slay their victims by infusing it 
into their blood; while others, relying on their muscular energy, suffocate 
their prey in their embraces and crush both body and bones into a pulpy 
mass. The tortoise draws himself into his shell as into a fortress and bids 
defiance to his foes; and the porcupine erects around his body an array of 
bayonets from which his enemies retire with dread. The strength of the 
ox, the buffalo and rhinoceros is in their necks, and which they apply 
with resistless force to gore and toss their enemies. The elephant by his 
weight treads his foes to death ; and the horse by a kick inflicts a wound 
that is often as fatal as the bullet of a rifle ; the space through which his 
foot passes, adding force to the blow. 

There are numerous proofs of some of the lower animals being aware 
that the momentum of a moving body is increased by the space through 
which it falls. Of several species of birds which feed on shell fish, some, 
when unable to crush the shells with their bills, carry them up in the 
air, and let them drop that they may be broken by the fall. (The Athe- 
nian poet ^Eschylus, it is said, was killed by a tortoise that an eagle drop- 
ped upon his bald head, which the bird, it is supposed, mistook for a stone.) 



366 Momentum of Running Water. [Book IV 

When the males of sheep or goats prepare to butt, they always recede 
backwards to some distance ; and then rushing impetuously forward, (ac- 
cumulating force as they go,) bring their foreheads in contact with a shock 
that sometimes proves fatal to both. The ancients, perhaps, from witness 
ing the battles of these animals, constructed military engines to act on the 
same principle. A ponderous beam was suspended at the middle by chains, 
and one end impelled, by the united efforts of a number of men at the op- 
posite end, against walls which it demolished with slow but sure effect. 
The battering end was generally, and with the Greeks and Romans uni- 
formly, protected by an iron or bronze cap in the form of a ram's head ; 
and the entire instrument was named after that animal. It was the most 
destructive of all their war machinery — no building, however solid, could 
long withstand its attacks. Plutarch, in his life of Anthony, mentions one 
eighty feet in length. 

The action of the ram is familiar to most people, but it may not be 
known to all that similar results might be produced by a liquid as by a solid 
— that a long column of water moving with great velocity might be made 
equally destructive as a beam of wood or iron — yet so it is. Waves of the 
sea act as water-rams against rocks or other barriers that impede their 
progress, and when their force is increased by storms of wind, the most 
solid structures give way before them. The old lighthouse on the Eddy- 
stone rocks was thus battered down during a storm in 1703, when the 
engineer, Mr. Winstanley, and all his people, perished. 

The increased force that water acquires when its motion is accelerated, 
might be shown by a thousand examples : a bank or trough that easily 
retains it when at rest, or when slightly moved, is often insufficient when 
its velocity is greatly increased. When the deep lock of a canal is opened 
to transfer a boat or a ship to a lower level, the water is permitted to de- 
scend by slow degrees : were the gates opened at once, the rushing mass 
would sweep the gates below before it, or the greater portion would be 
carried in the surge quite over them — and perhaps the vessel also. A 
sluggish stream drops almost perpendicularly over a precipice, but the mo- 
mentum of a rapid one shoots it over, and leaves, as at Niagara, a wide 
space between. It is the same with a stream issuing from a horizontal 
tube — if the liquid pass slowly through, it falls inertly at the orifice, but 
if its velocity be considerable, the jet is carried to a distance ere it touches 
the ground. The level of a great part of Holland is below the surface of 
the sea, and the dykes are in some parts thirty feet high : whenever a 
leak occurs, the greatest efforts are made to repair it immediately, and for 
the obvious reason that the aperture keeps enlarging and the liquid mass 
behind is put in motion towards it; thus the pressure is increased and, 
if the leak be not stopped, keeps increasing till it bears with irresistable 
force all obstructions away. A fatal example is recorded in the ancient 
history of Holland : — an ignorant burgher, near Dort, to be revenged on 
a neighbour, dug a hole through the dyke opposite the house of the latter, 
intending to close it after his neighbor's property had been destroyed ; 
but the water rushed through with an accelerating force, till all resistance 
was vain, and the whole country became deluged. The ancients were 
well aware of this accumulation of force in running waters. Allusions 
to it are very common among the oldest writers, and various maxims of 
life were drawn from it. The beginning of strife, says Solomon, " is as 
when one letteth out water" — the " breach of waters" — " breaking forth 
of waters" — "rushing of mighty waters," &c. are frequently mentioned, to 
indicate the irresistable influence of desolating evils when once admitted. 
That the force which a running stream thus acquires may be made to 



Chap. 1.] Hydraulic Ram. 367 

drive a portion of the liquid far above the source whence it flows, is obvi- 
ous from several operations in nature. During a storm of wind, long 
swelling waves in the open sea alternately rise and fall, without the crests 
or tops of any being elevated much above those of the rest ; but when 
they meet from opposite directions, or when their progress is suddenly 
arrested by the bow of a ship, by rocks, or other obstacles, pari of the 
water is driven to great elevations. There is a fine example of this at the 
Eddystone rocks — the heavy swells from the Bay of Biscay and from the 
Atlantic, roll in and break with inconceivable fury upon them, so that vo- 
lumes of water are thrown up with terrific violence, and the celebrated 
light-house sometimes appears from this cause like the pipe of a fountain 
enclosed in a stupendous jet d'eau. The light room in the old light-house 
was sixty feet above the sea, and it was often buried in the waves, so im- 
mense were the volumes of water thrown over it. 

The hydraulic ram raises water on precisely the same principle : a 
quantity of the liquid is set in motion through an inclined tube, and its es- 
cape from the lower orifice is made suddenly to cease, when the momen- 
tum of the moving mass drives up, like the waves, a portion of its own 
volume to an elevation much higher than that from which it descended. 
This may be illustrated by an experiment familiar to most people. Sup- 
pose the lower orifice of a tube (whose upper one is connected to a reser- 
voir of water) be closed with the finger, and a very minute stream be al- 
lowed to escape from it in an upward direction — the tiny jet would rise 
nearly to the surface of the reservoir ; it could not, of course, ascend 
higher — but if the finger were then moved to one side so as to allow a 
free escape till the whole contents of the tube were rapidly moving to the 
exit, and the orifice then at once contracted or closed as before, the jet 
would dart far above the reservoir; for in addition to the hydrostatic pres- 
sure which drove it up in the first instance, there would be a new force 
acting upon it, derived from the motion of the water. As in the case of 
a hammer of a few pounds weight, when it rests on the anvil it exerts a 
pressure on the latter with a force due to its weight only, but when put 
in motion by the hand of the smith, it descends with a force that is equiva- 
lent to the pressure of perhaps a ton. 

Every person accustomed to draw water from pipes that are supplied 
from very elevated sources, must have observed, when the cocks or dis- 
charging orifices are suddenly closed, a jar or tremor communicated to the 
pipes, and a snapping sound like that from smart blows of a hammer. These 
effects are produced by blows which the ends of the pipes receive from 
the water; the liquid particles in contact with the plug of a cock, when it 
is turned to stop the discharge, being forcibly driven up against it by those 
constituting the moving mass behind. The philosophical instrument named 
a water hammer illustrates this fact. The effect is much the same as if a 
solid rod moved with the same velocity as the water through the tube 
until its progress was stopped in the same manner, except that its mo- 
mentum would be concentrated on that point of the pipe against which it 
struck, whereas with the liquid rod the momentum would be communi- 
cated equally to, and might be transmitted from any part of, the lower end 
of the tube; hence it often occurs that the ends of such pipes, when made 
of lead, are swelled greatly beyond their original dimensions. We have 
seen some f of an inch bore, become enlarged to 1^ inches before they were 
ruptured. At a hospital in Bristol, England, a plumber was employed 
to convey water through a leaden pipe from a cistern in one of the upper 
stories to the kitchen below, and it happened that the lower end of the 
tube was burst nearly every time the cock was used. After several at- 



368 



WhitehursC s Water-Ram. 



[Book IV. 



tempts to remedy the evil, it was determined to solder one end of a smaller 
pipe immediately behind the cock, and to carry the other end to as high 
a level as the water in the cistern; and now it was found that on shutting 
the cock the pipe did not burst as before, but a jet of considerable height 
was forced from the upper end of this new pipe : it therefore became ne- 
cessary to increase its height to prevent water escaping from it — upon 
which it was continued to the top of the hospital, being twice the height 
of the supplying cistern, but where to the great surprise of those who 
constructed the work, some water still issued : a cistern was therefore 
placed to receive this water, which was found very convenient, since it 
was thus raised to the highest floors of the building without any extra 
labor. Here circumstances led the workmen to the construction of a water- 
ram without knowing that such a machine had been previously devised. 

The first person who is known to have raised water by a ram, designed 
for the purpose was, Mr. Whitehurst, a watchmaker of Derby, in England. 
He erected a machine similar to the one represented by the next figure, 
in 1772. A description of it was forwarded by him to the Royal Society, 
and published in vol. lv, of their Transactions. 




No. 167. Whitehurst's Water-Ram. 

A, represents the spring or reservoir, the surface of the water in which 
was of about the same level as the bottom of the cistern B. The main 
pipe from A to the cock at the end of C, was nearly six hundred feet in 
length, and one and a half inches bore. The cock was sixteen feet below 
A, and furnished water for the kitchen offices, &c. When it was opened 
the liquid column in A C was put in motion, and acquired a velocity due 
to a fall of sixteen feet; and as soon as the cock was shut, the momentum 
of this long column opened the valve, upon which part of the water rushed 
into the air-vessel and up the vertical pipe into B. This effect took place 
every time the cock was used, and as water was drawn from it at short 
intervals for household purposes, " from morning till night — all the days 
in the year," an abundance was raised into B, without any exertion or 
expense. 

Such was the first water-ram. As an original device, it is highly honor- 
able to the sagacity and ingenuity of its author; and the introduction of an 
air vessel, without which all apparatus of the kind could never be made 
durable, strengthens his claims upon our regard. In this machine he has 
shown that the mere act of drawing water from long tubes for ordinary 
purposes, may serve to raise a portion of their contents to a higher level ; 
an object that does not appear to have been previously attempted, or 
even thought of. The device also exhibits another mode, besides that 
by pressure engines, of deriving motive force from liquids thus drawn, 
and consequently opens another way by which the immense power ex- 
pended in raising water for the supply of cities, may again be given 



Chap. 1.] Montgolfier'' s Ram. 369 

out with the liquid from the lateral pipes. Notwithstanding the advan- 
tages derived from such an apparatus, under circumstances similar to 
those indicated by the figure, it does not appear to have elicited the at- 
• tention of engineers, nor does Whitehurst himself seem to have been aware 
of its adaptation as a substitute for forcing pumps, in locations wtiere the 
water drawn from the cock was not required, or could not be used. Had 
he pursued the subject, it is probable the idea of opening and closing the 
cock (by means of the water that escaped) with some such apparatus as 
figured in No. 160, would have occurred to him, and then his machine 
being made self-acting, would have been applicable in a thousand loca- 
tions. But these additions were not made, and the consequence was, that 
the invention was neglected, and but for the one next to be described, it 
would most likely have passed into oblivion, like the steam machines of 
Branca, Kircher, and Decaus, till called forth by the application of the 
same principle in more recent devices. 

Whenever we peruse accounts of the labors of ingenious men, in search 
of new discoveries in science or the arts, sympathy leads us to rejoice at 
their success and to grieve at their failure : like the readers of a well 
written novel who enter into the views, feelings and hopes of the hero ; 
realize his disappointments, partake of his pleasures, and become interested 
in his fate ; hence something like regret comes over us, when an indus- 
trious experimenter, led by his researches to the verge of an important 
discovery, is, by some circumstance diverted (perhaps temporarily) from 
it ; and a more fortunate or more sagacious rival steps in and bears off the 
prize from his grasp — a prize, which a few steps more would have put 
him in possession of. Thus Whitehurst with the water-ram, like Papin 
with the steam-engine, discontinued his researches at the most interesting 
point — at the very turning of the tide that would have carried him to the 
goal ; and hence the fruit of both their labors has contributed but to en- 
hance the glory of their successors. 

The Belier Jiydrauliaue of Montgolfier was invented in 1796. (Its au- 
thor was a French paper maker, and the same gentleman who, in conjunc- 
tion with his brother, invented balloons in 1782.) Although it is on the 
principle of Whitehurst's machine, its invention is believed to have been 
entirely independent of the latter. But if it were even admitted that 
Montgolfier was acquainted with what Whitehurst had done, still he has, 
by his improvements, made the ram entirely his own. He found it a 
comparatively useless device, and he rendered it one of the most efficient 
— it was neglected or forgotten, and he not only revived it, but gave it a 
permanent place among hydraulic machines, and actually made it the 
most interesting of them all. It was, previous to his time, but an embryo; 
when, like another Prometheus, he not only wrought it into shape and 
beauty, but imparted to it, as it were, a principle of life, that rendered its 
movements self-acting ; for it requires neither the attendance of man, nor 
any thing else, to keep it in play, but the momentum of the water it is 
employed to elevate. Like the organization of animal life, and the me- 
chanism by which the blood circulates, the pulsations of this admirable 
machine incessantly continue day and night, for months and years; while 
nothing but a deficiency of the liquid, or defects in the apparatus can in^ 
duce it to stop. It is, compared to Whitehurst's, what the steam-engine 
of Watt, is to that of Savary or Newcomen. 

Montgolfier positively denied having borrowed the idea from any one — 
he claimed the invention as wholly his own, and there is no reason what- 
ever to question his veracity. The same discoveries have often been, and 
still are, made in the same and in distant countries, independently of each 

47 



370 



Montgolfier 's 



[Book IV 



other. It is a common occurrence, and from the constitution of the hu- 
man mind will always be one. A patent was taken out in England for 
self-acting rams in 1797 by Mr. Boulton, the partner of "Watt, and as no 
reference was made in the specification to Montgolfier, many persons ima- 
gined them to be of English origin, a circumstance that elicited some re- 
marks from their author. " Cette invention (says Montgolfier) n'est point 
d'origine Anglaise, elle appartient toute entiere a la France ; je declare 
que j'en suis le seul inventeur, et que 1'idee ne m'en a ete fournie par 
personne ; il est vrai qu'un de mes amis a fait passer, avec mon agrement, 
a MM. Watt et Boulton, copie de plusieurs dessins que j'avais faits de 
cette machine, avec un memoire detaille sur ses applications. Ce sont ces 
memes dessins qui ont ete fidelement copies dans la patente prise par M. 
Boulton a Londres, en date du 13 Decembre 1797 ; ce qui est une verite 
dont il est bien eloigne de disconvenir, ainsi que le respectable M. Watt." 
We have inserted this extract from Hachette, because we really supposed 
on reading the specification of Boulton's patent in the Repertory of Arts, 
(for 1798, vol. ix,) that the various modifications of the ram there des- 
cribed were the invention of that gentleman. The patent was granted to 
" Matthew Boulton, for his invention of improved apparatus and methods 
for raising water and other fluids." 




No. 168. Montgolfier'e Ram. 



No. 169. The same. 



No. 168 represents a simple form of Montgolfier's ram. The motive 
column descends from a spring or brook A through the pipe B, near^ the 
end of which an air chamber D, and rising main F, are attached to it as 
shown in the cut. At the extreme end of B, the orifice is opened and 
-closed by a valve E, instead of the cock in No. 167. This valve opens 
downwards and may either be a spherical one as in No. 168, or a common 
spindle one as in No. 169. It is the play of this valve that renders the 
machine self-acting. To accomplish this, the valve is made of, or loaded 
with, such a weight as just to open when the water in B is at rest ; i. e. it 
must be so heavy as to overcome the pressure against its under side when 
closed, as represented at No. 169. Now suppose this valve open as in 
No. 168, the water flowing through B soon acquires an additional force 
that carries up the valve against its seat ; then, as in shutting the cock of 
Whitehurst's machine, a portion of the water will enter and rise in F, the 
valve of the air chamber preventing its return. When this has taken place 
the water in B has been brought to rest, and as in that state its pressure 
is insufficient to sustain the weight of the valve, E opens ; (descends) the 
water in B is again put in motion, and again it closes E as before, when 
another portion is driven into the air vessel and pipe F ; and thus the 



Chap. l.J Water-Ram. 371 

operation is continued, as long as the spring affords a sufficient supply and 
the apparatus remains in order. 

The surface of the water in the spring or source should always be kept 
at the same elevation, so that its pressure against the valve E may always 
be uniform — otherwise the weight of E would have to be altered as the 
surface of the spring rose and fell. 

This beautiful machine may be adapted to numerous locations in every 
country. When the perpendicular fall from the spring to the valve E is 
but a few feet, and the water is required to be raised to a considerable 
height through F, then, the length of the ram or pipe B, must be in- 
creased, and to such an extent that the water in it is not forced back into 
the spring when E closes, which will always be the case if B is not of 
sufficient length. Mr. Millington, who erected several in England, justly 
observes that a very insignificant pressing column is capable of raising a 
very high ascending one, so that a sufficient fall of water may be obtained 
in almost every running brook, by damming the upper end to produce the 
"eservoir, and carrying the pipe down the natural channel of the stream 
until a sufficient fall is obtained. In this way a ram has been made to raise 
one hundred hogsheads of water in twenty-four hours to a perpendicular 
height of one hundred and thirty-four feet, by a fall of only four feet and 
a half. M. Fischer of Schaffhausen, constructed a water-ram in the form 
of a beautiful antique altar, nearly in the style of that of Esculapius, as 
represented in various engravings. A basin about six inches in depth, and 
from eighteen to twenty inches in diameter, received the water that formed 
the motive column. This water flowed through pipes three inches in di- 
ameter that descended in a spiral form into the base of the altar ; on the 
valve opening a third of the water escaped, and the rest was forced up to 
a castle several hundred feet above the level of the Rhine. 

A long tube laid along the edge of a rapid river, as the Niagara above 
the falls, or the Mississippi, might thus be used instead of pumps, water 
wheels, steam-engines and horses, to raise the water over the highest 
banks and supply inland towns, however elevated their location might be ; 
and there is scarcely a farmer in the land but who might, in the absence 
of other sources, furnish his dwelling and barns with water in the same 
way, from a brook, creek, rivulet or pond. 

If a ram of large dimensions, and made like No. 168, be used to raise 
water to a great elevation, it would be subject to an inconvenience that 
would soon destroy the beneficial effect of the air chamber. When speak- 
ing of the air vessels of fire-engines, in the third book, we observed that if 
air be subjected to great pressure in contact with water, it in time be- 
comes incorporated with or absorbed by the latter. As might be supposed, 
the same thing occurs in water-rams ; as these when used are inces- 
santly at work both day and night. To remedy this, Montgolfier ingeni- 
ously adapted a very small valve (opening inwards) to the pipe beneath the 
air chamber, and which was opened and shut by the ordinary action of the 
machine. Thus, when the flow of the water through B is suddenly stop- 
ped by the valve E, a partial vacuum is produced immediately below the 
air chamber by the recoil of the water, at which instant the small valve 
opens and a portion of air enters and supplies that which the water ab- 
sorbs. Sometimes this sniffing valve, as it has been named, is adapted to 
another chamber immediately below that which forms the reservoir of air, 
as at B in No. 169. In small rams a sufficient supply is found to enter at 
the valve E. 

Although air chambers or vessels are not, strictly speaking, constituent 
elements of water-rams, they are indispensable to the permanent operation 



372 



Canne Hydraulique 



[Book IV. 



of these machines. Without them, the pipes would soon be ruptured by the 
violent concussion consequent on the sudden stoppage of the efflux of the 
motive column. They perform a similar part to that of the bags of wool, &c. 
which the ancients, when besieged, interposed between their walls and the 
battering rams of the besiegers, in order to break the force of the blows. 

The ram has also been used in a few cases to raise water by atmos- 
pheric pressure from a lower level, so as to discharge it at the same level 
with the motive column or even higher. See Siphon Ram, in next book. 
The device by which Montgolfier made the ram self-acting, is one of 
the neatest imaginable. It is unique : there never was any thing like it 
in practical hydraulics, or in the whole range of the arts ; and its simpli- 
city is equal to its novelty, and useful effects. Perhaps it may be said that 
he only added a valve to Whitehurst's machine : be it so — but that sim- 
ple valve instantly changed, as by magic, the whole character of the ap- 
paratus — like the mere change of the cap, which transformed the Leech 
Hakim into Saladin. a And the emotions of Cceur de Lion, upon finding 
his great adversary had been his physician in disguise, were not more ex- 
quisite than those, which an admirer of this department of philosophy ex- 
periences, when he contemplates for the first time the metamorphosis of 
the English machine by the French Savan. The name of Montgolfier 
will justly be associated with this admirable machine in future ages. 
When all political and ecclesiastical crusaders are forgotten, and the me- 
mories of all who have hewed a passage to notoriety merely by the sword, 
will be detested — the name of its inventor will be embalmed in the recol- 
lections of an admiring posterity. 

The water cane, or canne hydraulique, raises water in a different man- 
ner from any apparatus yet described. A modification of it in miniature 
has long been employed in the lecture room, but it is seldom met with in 
descriptions of hydraulic machines. It is represented at No. 170 ; and 

consists of a vertical tube, in out- 
ward appearance like a walking 
cane, having a valve opening up- 
wards at the bottom, and placed 
in the liquid to be raised. Sup- 
pose the lower end twelve or fif- 
teen inches below the surface, the 
water of course would enter 
through the valve and stand at 
the same height within as with- 
out : now if the tube were raised 
quickly, but not entirely out of 
the water, the valve would close 
and the liquid within would be 
carried up with it ; and if, when 
the tube was at the highest point 
of the stroke, its motion was sud- 
denly reversed (by jerking it back) 
the liquid column within would 
still continue to ascend until the 
momentum imparted to it at the 
first was expended ; hence a va- 
cuity would be left in the lower 
part of the instrument into which 
a fresh portion of water would enter, and by repeating the operation the 

■ Walter Scott's Tales of the Crusaders. 




No. no No. m 



No. 172. 



Chap. 1.] And its Modifications. 373 

tube would become filled, and a jet of water would then be thrown from 
the upper orifice at every stroke. This effect obviously depends upon the 
rapidity with which the instrument is worked, i. e. a sufficient velocity 
must be given to the water by the upward stroke to prevent it descend- 
ing, till the tube again reaches the lowest point, and consequently receives 
another supply of water. The instrument should be straight and the bore 
smooth and uniform, that the liquid may glide through with the least pos- 
sible obstruction. As its length must be equal to the elevation to which 
the water is to be raised, it is necessarily of limited application, and espe- 
cially so since the whole (both water and apparatus) has to be lifted at 
every stroke — not merely the liquid that is discharged, but the whole 
contents of the machine. 

By making the upper part of the tube slide within another that is fixed, 
a short part only of the apparatus might then be moved, and by connect- 
ing an air chamber as in No. 171, a continual stream from the discharging 
orifice might be produced. A stuffing box should be adapted to the end 
of the fixed tube. Hachette suggested the application of a spring pole 
(like those used in old lathes) to communicate the quick reciprocating mo- 
tion which these machines require. 

No. 172 represents another form of the instrument. Two spiral tubes 
coiled round in opposite directions are secured to and moved by a verti- 
cal shaft. Their upper ends are united and terminate in one discharging 
orifice; the lower ones are enlarged, and each has a valve or clack 
opening inwards to retain the water that enters. By means of the handle 
A, which is mortised to the shaft, an alternating circular motion is im- 
parted to the whole, and the water thereby raised through these coiled 
tubes on precisely the same principle as through the perpendicular ones 
just described. Thus, when the handle is moved either to the right hand 
or to the left, one valve closes, and the water within receives an impulse 
that continues its motion along the tube after the movement of the latter 
is reversed ; and by the time its momentum is expended a fresh portion 
of water has entered that prevents its return. In this manner all the coils 
become filled, and then every additional supply that enters below drives 
before it an equal portion from the orifice above. This machine, there- 
fore differs from Nos. 170 and 171 only, in being adapted to a horizon- 
tal instead of a perpendicular movement. Each tube in the figure forms 
a distinct machine, and should be considered without reference to the other 
Their discharging orifices are united to show how a constant jet may be 
produced. By making the upper part turn in a stuffing box in the bottom 
of a fixed tube, as in No. 171, water might then be raised higher than the 
movable part of the apparatus. 

That property by which all bodies tend to continue either in a state of 
rest or motion, viz : inertia, increases the effect of these machines, for when 
the momentum imparted to the liquid in the tubes is exhausted, inertia 
alone prevents it from instantaneously flowing back, and hence there is 
time for an additional portion of water to enter at the valve. The action 
of the canne hydraulique is similar to that by which persons throw water 
to a distance from a bucket, or a wash-basin. The momentum given to 
these vessels and their contents carries the latter to a distance, while the 
former are held back or retained in the hands. Coals are thus thrown from 
a scuttle, earth from a shovel, and it is the same when a traveler on a 
galloping horse, or when drawn furiously in an open carriage, continues 
on his journey after the animal suddenly stops — his adhesion to his seat, 
oot being sufficient to resist the motal inertia of his body. 



374 Machines for Raising Water by Fire. [Book 1 V 



CHAPTER II. 



Machines for raising water by fire : Air machines — Ancient weather-glasses — Dilatation of air by beat 
and condensation by cold — Ancient Egyptian air-machines — Statue of Memnon— Statues of Serapis and 
the Bird of Memnon — Decaus' and Kircher's machinery to account for the sounds of the Theban Idol- 
Remarks on the Statue of Memnon — Machine for raising water by the sun's heat, from Heron — Similar 
machines in the sixteenth century — Air-machines by Porta and Decaus — Distilling by the sun's heat— Mu- 
sical air machines by Drebble and Decaus — Air machines acted on by ordinary fire — Modifications of them 
employed in ancient altars — Bronze altars — Tricks performed by the heathen priests with fire — Others 
by heated air and vapor — Bellows employed in ancient altars — Tricks performed at altars mentioned by 
Heron — Altar that feeds itself with flame, from Heron— Ingenuity displayed by ancient priests — Secrets 
of the temples — The Spiritalia — Sketch of its contents — Curious Lustral Vase. 

A separate book might with propriety have been devoted to machines 
which raise water through tubes by means of the weight, pressure, mo- 
mentum, or other natural properties of liquids, without the necessary in- 
tervention of wheels, cranks, levers, &c. With such, those now to be 
described might also have been classed, since they too require neither 
external machinery nor force. They differ however from pressure- 
engines and water-rams, and every other device yet noticed, in bringing 
into action a new element, viz. heat or fire. It is by this that the force 
upon which their movements depend is generated, viz. in the expansion 
of elastic fluids. There are two kinds of these machines which differ ac- 
cording to the fluid medium upon which the fire is made to act. In some 
this is common air, in others steam or vapor of water, and sometimes both 
steam and air have been employed. The present chapter is appropriated 
to air machines. These might be divided into two classes, according to 
the nature of the heat employed ; in some this is derived from the sun ; 
in others, from ordinary fire. Those in each class might also be arrang- 
ed according to that property of the air upon which their action depends, 
viz. 1. the force developed by its expansion ; 2. the vacuum formed by its 
condensation ; 3. those in which both are combined. The first might be 
compared to forcing pumps, the second to sucking or atmospheric ones, 
and the third to those which both suck and force up the water. 

It was observed in the second book (page 176) that all gases or airs 
are expanded by heat and contracted by cold. A proof of this is afforded 
by the usual mode of employing cupping-glasses ; a minute piece of cot- 
ton or sponge dipped in alcohol is inflamed and placed in a glass ; upon 
which the air becomes dilated or increased in bulk, so that a great part 
is driven out to make room for the rest ; the mouth of the instrument is 
then applied to the place from which blood is to be withdrawn; the flame of 
the cotton is thereby extinguished and as the remaining air becomes cool 
it cannot resume its previous state of density, and consequently a vacuity 
or void is left in the glass. Plumbers sometimes make small square boxes 
of sheet lead ; and on soldering in the covers the temperature of the 
contained air is so greatly increased, that before the soldering is completed 
a large portion is expelled, and when the boxes become cool every side 
is found slightly collapsed. This result is the required proof of the ves- 



Chap. 2.] Dilatability of Air by Heat. 375 

sels being tight. Now it is clear that if a communication was opened by 
a tube between the interior of one of these boxes and a vessel of water 
placed a few feet below, that the liquid would be forced into it (by the 
atmosphere) until the contained air occupied no greater space than it did 
before any part was driven out by the heat. This mode of raising liquids 
may be illustrated at the tea-table : Let a saucer be half filled wkh cold 
water, hold an inverted cup just over it and apply for a moment a small 
slip of lighted paper to the interior of the cup, drop the paper on the 
water and cover it with the cup, when the liquid contents of the saucer 
will be instantly forced up into the inverted vessel. 

If an inverted glass siphon be partly filled with water and the orifice 
of one leg be then closed and that leg be held to the fire, the air expand- 
ing will drive out the liquid and cause it to ascend in the other leg. 
Several philosophical instruments illustrate the same thing. Previous to 
the discovery of atmospheric pressure and the invention of the barometer, 
the expansion of air by heat was the principle upon which the ancient 
weather glasses were constructed. They were made in great variety. 
The simplest consisted of a glass tube having a bulb blown on the closed 
end. It was held over a fire to dilate the air, and the open end was 
then plunged into a vessel of water. Its construction was the same as the 
modern barometer. Variations in the temperature and density of the 
atmosphere caused the water to rise and fall in the tube, as the contained 
air was dilated and contracted, and thus changes in the weather were 
indicated. From these instruments the barometer received its former name 
of " the weather glass. " a 

The degree of elevation to which water can be thus raised depends 
upon the temperature to which the contained air is subjected ; its dilatation 
or increase of bulk being, according to some authors, in common with 

a The following extract from a book published ten years before the discovery of at- 
mospheric pressure, may interest some readers. Although the instruments to which it 
refers are no longer in use, they ought not to be entirely forgotten. 

"A weather-glasse is a structure of at the least two glasses [a tube and the vessel 
containing the water] sometimes of three, foure, or more as occasion serveth, inclosing 
a quantity of water, and a porcion of ayer proporcionable ; by whose condensacion 
or rarifaction the included water is subject unto a continual mocion, either upward or 
downward ; by which mocion of the water is commonly foreshown, the state, change, 
and alteracion of the weather ; — for I speak no more than what my own experience hath 
made me bold to affirm ; you may (the time of the year, aud the following observacions 
understand ingly considered) bee able certainly to foretell the alteracion or uncertainty 
of the weather a good many hours before it come to pass. 

There are divers severall fashions of weather-glasses, but principally two. 1. The 
circular glasse. 2. The perpendicular glasse. The perpendiculars are either single, 
double or treble. The single perpendiculars are of two sorts, either fixt or moveable : 
The fixt are of contrary qualities ; either such whose included water doth move upward 
with cold, and downward with heat, or else upward with heat and downward with cold. 
In the double and treble perpendiculars, as the water ascendeth in one, it descendeth as 
much or more in the other. In the moveable perpendiculars, the glasse being artificially 
hanged, it moveth up and down with the water." 

The author then describes the various kinds mentioned and tells his reader " if you doe 
well observe the form of the figures you cannot go amisse." He also gives directions for 
• making coloured water for the tubes, such as " may be both an ornament to the work and 
delectable to the eye." Treatise on Art and Nature, A. D. 1633 or 4. See account of this 
book page 321. A modification of an air-glass may be found in the Forcible Movements 
of Decaus, (plate viii,) which he names an Engine that shall move of itself. Lord Bacon, 
in whose time these air glasses were common, presented what appears to have been an 
improved one and of his own invention, to the Earl of Essex, who it is said, was so capti- 
vated with it that he presented the donor with Twickenham Park and its garden, as a 
place for his studies. The instrument was named ' A secret curiosity of nature, whereby to 
know the season of every hour of the year, by a Philosophical Glass, placed (xoith a small propor- 
tion of water) in a chamber. An account of Lord Bacon's Works, London, 1679. 



376 Air Machines. [Book IV. 

other permanently elastic fluids, in a geometrical progression to equal in- 
crements of heat. A volume of air at ordinary temperatures is increased 
over one third, if raised to 212° Fahrenheit. At the fusing point of lead 
(about 600°) it is more than doubled, and at the heat of 1100°, it would 
be tripled. Let a small glass tube be attached to the neck of a Florence 
flask, and heat both in boiling water ; if the end of the tube be then placed 
in mercury, the latter will as the air becomes cooled rise in the tube, to the 
height of ten inches — equal to about eleven feet of water. If they were 
heated to 600° it would rise to fifteen inches ; and if to 1100° to twenty- 
one or two inches. We have connected a tube to the mouth of a common 
quart bottle, and after heating the latter over a fire, placed the end of 
the tube in mercury, and on removing the whole to the open air, then at 
50°, the mercury in a few minutes rose to sixteen inches ; hence rather 
more than one half of the air had been expelled by the heat. These 
effects take place when the enclosed air is dry ; but if it be moist, or if a 
drop or two of water be in the vessel, the results are greater, because the 
vapor of the liquid would alone fill or nearly fill the vessel and would 
drive out a corresponding quantity of air. 

This mode of creating a vacuum and raising water by the dilatation and 
condensation of air is now seldom used, because superior results, as just 
intimated, are obtained from steam and with less expense. Air machines 
are however interesting in several respects. They are among the earliest 
examples of elastic fluids being employed as a moving power, induced by 
alternate changes of temperature. They constitute the first link in that 
chain of devices that has now terminated in the steam engine, but which 
will probably be prolonged through future ages by the addition of even 
more efficient mechanism. In this view of the subject, air machines will 
connect the researches and inventions of antiquity, in the development and 
applications of the most valuable because most pliable of all motive forces, 
with every improvement future engineers may make to the end of time. 

The oldest air-machines known were made in Egypt, and the oldest 
account extant of such devices is also derived from that country, viz. from 
the Spiritalia. It is also worthy of remark that they are associated by 
Heron with other devices of the priesthood, for exciting wonder and per- 
forming prodigies before the people ; thus affording a collateral proof that 
occupants of the ancient temples at Thebes, Memphis and Heliopolis 
were intimately acquainted with the principles of natural philosophy ; 
and fully capable of teaching those who flocked to them for information, 
from Greece and neighboring countries. There is a circumstance too 
that indicates a more thorough and practical acquaintance with the me- 
chanical properties of elastic fluids, and the means of exciting those pro- 
perties than might at first be supposed, viz. in the substitution of the 
sun's heat for that of ordinary fires. This seems to have been adopted in 
cases where the miracle to be wrought could not be accomplished by the 
latter without danger of detection, or when it could not be so secretly 
effected, or could not be performed with such imposing effect. Of 
this, the vocal statue on the plain of Thebes is an example. This gi- 
gantic idol saluted the rising sun and continued to utter sounds as long as 
the solar beams were shed over it, and while surrounded by the myriads 
that worshipped at its shrine. Now these sounds were produced, accor- 
ding to Heron, by the dilatation of air, or by vapor evolved by the sun's 
heat from water contained in close vessels, that were concealed in or con- 
nected to the base of the statue, and exposed to the solar rays. The 
expanded fluid, it is supposed, was conveyed through tubes whose orifices 
were fashioned to produce the required sounds. 



Chap 2.] Statue of Memnon. 377 

Cambyses desirous of ascertaining the concealed mechanism, it is said, 
broke the statue from the head to the middle. According to some writers 
he discovered nothing; while others mention an opinion prevalent among 
the Egyptians that the image previously uttered the seven mysterious 
vowels, but never afterwards. Strabo has recorded a tradition that the in- 
jury was caused by an earthquake. He visited Egypt in the first century, 
and remarks, that early one morning as he and Gallus the prefect, with many 
other friends, and a large number of soldiers were standing by the statue, 
they heard a certain sound, but could not determine whether it came from 
the trunk or the base ; there was however a prevailing belief that it pro- 
ceeded from the latter or its vicinity. The sounds finally ceased in the 
fourth century, when Christianity became established in the country. 
Some authors have supposed two different devices were employed ; one 
previous to, and the other subsequent to the mutilation of the statue ; and 
that one or both consisted of springs, &c. on the principle of some of the 
speaking heads of the middle ages. Heron, however, who must have 
been familiar with the image and the sounds uttered by it, attributed the 
latter to air or vapor, evolved and expanded by solar heat ; so that, how- 
ever we may speculate on the subject, in his opinion the Pharaonic priest- 
hood were well acquainted with the dilatation and contraction of airs by 
heat and cold, and with various modes of employing them. Moreover, 
the movements of the famous statue of Serapis and also those of the Bird 
of Memnon (an image which we have previously mentioned) were also 
produced by air or vapor dilated by the sun's heat ; and we shall present- 
ly see that tricks on the same principle were frequently performed at an- 
cient altars. 

Modern expositions of the mechanism or supposed mechanism of the 
Theban Idol are derived from the Spiritalia. That of Decaus consists 
of a close vessel, of the form of a pedestal, having a partition across it by 
which two air-tight compartments are formed. One of these is half filled 
with water and exposed to the solar rays — the other contains air and to 
its upper part are connected two organ pipes or reeds that communicate 
with the statue. A communication is formed between the two compart- 
ments by a siphon, the legs of which are inserted at the top and descend 
nearly to the bottom of each compartment. Thus when the sun warmed 
the vessel containing water, the air and vapor within, became expanded 
and pressing on the surface of the liquid forced part of the latter through 
the siphon into the other compartment, by which a corresponding portion 
of air was forced through the organ pipes. A figure and details of this 
apparatus form the 23rd plate of Decaus' Forcible Movements. Pausa- 
nias and some other ancient authors compared the sounds to those produ- 
ced by the vibration of harp strings ; and Juvenal, who was exiled to 
Egypt by Domitian, seems to have been of the same opinion. 

- - - - when the radiant beam of morning rings 

On shatter'd Memnon's still harmonious strings. — xv. Sat. 

Hence Kircher in his explanation, instead of conveying the rarefied air, 
or vapor through a wind instrument, made it act against the vanes of a 
wheel, as in Branca's steam machine, and as the wheel was thus blown 
round, a number of pins attached to its periphery struck a series of wires 
so arranged as to receive the blows. A figure of this device is inserted 
in his (Edipus JEgyptiacus. Rome, 1652, Tom. iii, page 326. 

Whatever the device was, it seems to have been as admirable in its 
execution and the disposition of the mechanism, as in its conception. We 
are not certain that it was ever fully understood except by the priests of 

48 



378 



Air Machine — From Heron. 



[Book IV 



the adjoining temple. The Romans do not appear to have had sufficient 
curiosity to give it a critical examination. What a contrast it forms with 
some modern wonders ! These have puzzled people only while exami- 
nation was prohibited — while access to them was denied, as the chess- 
player of Kempelen ; but the colossal android of Thebes defied the scruti- 
ny of the world through unknown periods of time. In it, the old priests 
of Egypt have sent down a surprising specimen of their skill. We know 
from the Bible that they had a profound knowledge of Natural Magic ; 
i. e. of the applications of science to purposes of deception, and this statue 
confirms the scriptural account : — it shows us what an amount of labor 
and ingenuity was expended in the fabrication of idols, and to what a 
prodigious extent the ancient systems of delusion were carried — how the 
very magnitude and even sublimity of the impostures were calculated to 
bear down the intellect and establish an unshaken belief in the communion 
of the priests with the gods. 

If a close metallic vessel containing water be exposed to the sun, the 
air in the upper part will become dilated by the heat and may be employ- 
ed to raise the water : for if a tube be inserted at the top, and the lower 
end reach nearly to the bottom, the elasticity of the air will be expended in 
forcing the liquid up the tube and to an elevation according to the increase 
of its temperature. A device of this kind is described by Heron which 
is represented in the annexed cut. 

On the lid of a box or cis- 
tern containing water is placed 
a globe, also partly filled with 
the same fluid. A pipe rises 
from the cistern to about the 
centre of the globe. Another 
pipe through which the water 
is to be raised proceeds from 
near the bottom of the globe 
and terminates over a vase or 
cup, which communicates with 
the cistern as represented. 
When the sun beams fall on 
the globe, the air within is ra- 
refied and by its expansion 
forces the water through the 
pipe into the vase, through 
which it descends again into 
the cistern. When the sun beams are withdrawn and the surface of 
the globe becomes cool, a partial vacuum is formed in the globe, and the 
pressure of the atmosphere then drives a fresh portion into it from the 
cistern below ; when it is again ready to be acted on by the sun as before. 
In addition to the air, at first contained in the globe, a quantity of vapor 
or low steam would be evolved by the heat and contribute greatly to the 
result. The cistern represents an open reservoir which may be at a dis- 
tance from the globe, and the vase merely exhibits the place of discharge 
— having no necessary connection with the reservoir. The apparatus as 
a model, is figured just as philosophical instruments still are. Thus in 
modern books, a pump (for example) is often shown as discharging water 
into the reservoir from which it raises it. We make these remarks be- 
cause some persons are too apt to consider these ancient figures as literal 
representations of working machines, whereas, they were designed merely 
to illustrate the principles upon which the movements depended ; and as 




No. 173. Raising Water by the Sun. From Heron. 



Chap. 2.] Porta's Natural Magic. 379 

specimens from which others for practical purposes might be deduced. 
It is quite a common remark in old authors, after describing a device, to 
observe that various machines for other purposes may be derived from it, 
and excuse themselves for not pointing out particular modes of doing this, 
because they considered them too obvious to require it. 

Whether such modes of raising water were practised in Europe previ- 
ous to the sixteenth century, we have no means of ascertaining; but in the 
middle of that and the beginning of the following one they are frequently 
to be met with in old authors. 

Baptist Porta, in his Natural Magic, after describing a method of rais- 
ing water from the bottom to the top of a tower, by means of a vacuum 
formed by water flowing from a close vessel ; — next proposes a mode of 
accomplishing the same object " by heat alone." A close vessel of brass 
was to be placed upon the tower, having a pipe connected to its upper 
part and extending down to the water to be raised ; the orifice being a 
short distance below the surface. The vessel was then " to be made 
hot by the sun, or fire" to rarefy the contained air and expel a portion of it 
through the pipe. As the vessel grows cold, he observes, the remaining 
air is condensed, and because it cannot then fill the vacuity, " the water is 
called in and ascends thither." a (Book xix. chap. 3.) He does not men- 
tion the height of the tower because the philosophers of that age had no 
idea that the elevation to which water would ascend into a vacuum had 
any limits — and hence in another part of the same work Porta uses the 
following language — " A vacuum is so abhorred by nature that the world 
would sooner be pulled asunder than any vacuity can be admitted." 
(Book xviii. chap. 1.) There is another passage in the 5th chapter of the 
19th Book, from which it seems that he employed the elastice force of 
air or steam, or a mixture of both as in No. 174 — and generated either by 
the heat of the sun, or by that of lamps or candles, as shown at No. 189. 

After describing a fountain of compression, which he exhibited to some 
of the great Lords of Venice, and the operation of which he says caused 
great surprise as there was no visible cause for the water flying so high — 
he continues, " I also made another place near this fountain that let in light, 
and when the air was extenuated, so long as any light lasted the fountain 
threw out water, which was a thing of much admiration, and yet but little 
labor." This passage is probably imperfectly translated. 

No. 174, on the next page, forms the 9th plate attached to the " Forcible 
Movements" of Decaus. (Translated by Leak, London, 1659.) It exhi- 
bits an extension of Heron's machine already noticed, (No. 173.) Decaus 
says " this engine hath a great effect in hot places as in Spain and Italy.' 

Four air tight copper vessels, a foot square and 8 or 9 inches deep, are 
so arranged that the sun may shine strongly upon them. A pipe, having 
a valve o, opening upwards, communicates with the lower part of each, to 
supply them with water from the spring below. Another pipe passes 
over the upper surfaces, having branches which descend nearly to the bot- 
tom of each vessel. A valve is also placed in this pipe, from the upper 
end of which the jet of the fountain issues. At the commencement, each 
vessel is about one third filled with water, through openings on the top, 
which are then plugged up. " Then the sun shining upon the said en- 
gine shall make an expression by rarefying the enclosed air and force the 

a Natural Magic k in ticenty books by John Baptist Porta, wherein are set forth all the riches 
and delights of the Natural Sciences." — London, 1658. 

It contains, beside a multitude of absurdities, many ingenious devices. The trombe, 
camera obscura. air gun, repeating guns, air tubes, ear trumpets, &c. &c. are described. 
The work was first published in 1560. 



380 



Air Machines — From Decaus. 



[Book IV 



water to flow out as in the figure. And after the heat of the day is pass 
ed and the night shall come, the vessels shall draw the water of the 
cistern [spring] by the pipe and sucker [lower valve] and shall fill the 

vessels as before. And you must observe that the two 

suckers [valves] must be made very light and likewise very just, so as 
the water may not descend by them after it is raised." 




No. 174. Air Machine, from Decaus. 

An improvement upon the preceding machine is next given by Decaus. 
The form of the vessels is altered, and double convex lenses or " burning 
glasses" are so arranged on their covers as to collect " the raies of 
the sun within the said vessels, the which will cause a great heat 
to the water, and by that means make it spring forth with great abun- 
dance, and also higher if it be required." (See the figure below.) It is, 
we think, in the range of probability that the heat of the solar rays may 
yet be applied in some situations to raise water with effect 




^iii>iiiiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiii!iiiiiiii'!!!iiiiiiiiHiiiii!iii!iiiiiiii!iniuiiiiiiiiiiiiHi;i!iiiiiiiiiil!iilniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii<iiiiiiiiiiliiiiinniiiiuu 



No. 175. Air Engine, from Decaus. 

Whether this application of lenses "to encrease the force of the sun" 
in air engines, was a device of Decaus, we know not. The idea however 



Chap. 2.] 



Distilling by the Sun's Heat. 



381 



would naturally occur to any engineer of the time, engaged on the im 
provement of such machines, because distilling by the sun both with len- 
ses and without them was a common practice with chemists in that age 
and some centuries before. Baptist Porta described the process in the 
tenth book of his Natural Magic, and observes that " the waters extract- 
ed by the sun are the best." See also Maison Rustique, Paris, 1574, 
page 211. Kircher's Mundus Subterraneus , Tom. ii, 392. Other au- 
thors also describe the application both of convex and concave lenses to 
concentrate the solar rays on distilling vessels ; a practice probably as old 
as the time of Archimedes, or even older. We give an extract from an 
English translation of one of Gesner's works, who died in 1545. 

" Further, although that the Chimisticke authours doe teach and shew 
diverse fashions of distilling by ascension, yet may all these wai-es be 

brought into three orders. The first manner is, when we 

distill anie liquide substance or flowers in the sunne by force of his heate. 

- The singular 

man Adam Louder, in his 
treatise on the arte of dis- 
tilling, setteth forth an 
easie maner of distilling 
by the heate of the sunne 

beames and the 

same is to be wrought on 
this wise : take, saith Lou- 
cier, a hollowe burning 
glasse, which directlie 
place towarde the hote 
beames of the sunne, after 
(betweene the beams of 
the sunne and the burning- 
glasse,) set the glass bodie 
[Retort] - - - - in such 
manner, that the beames 
of the hote sunne falling into the hollow glasse, maie so beate backe 
and extende to the glasse bodie with the proper matter (as to the object 
standing righte against) - - - - as more livelie appeareth by this figure 
here described."* 

Air dilated and vapor evolved by the sun's heat were also used to pro- 
duce music in the middle ages, a device which often caused that celestial 
melody which, like the harp of Dunstan, acquired for its authors a repu- 
tation, sometimes of superior sanctity, and at others of dealing with the 
wicked one. The musical machine of the famous Drebble, according to 
Bishop Wilkins, was of this kind: i. e. a modification of the supposed one 
in the Statue of Memnon. Drebble's machine, says the Bishop, " would 
of itself render a soft and pleasant harmony when exposed to the sun's 
rays, but being removed into the shade would presently become silent. 
The reason of it was this ; the warmth of the sun working upon some 

a The, ■practice of the new and old phisicke, wherein is contained the most excellent secrets 
of phisicke and philosophic, devided into foure Books — in the which arethebest approved reme- 
dies for the diseases, as well inicard as outicard, of al the parts of mans body: treating very 
amplie of al distillations oficaters, ofoyles, balmes, quintessences, xcith the extraction of arti- 
ficial saltes, the vse and preparation of antimony, and potable gold, gathered out of the best 
and most approved authours, by that excellent Doctor Gesnerus. Also the pictures and maner 
to make the vessels, furnaces and other instruments thereunto belonging. Neicly corrected 
and published in Englishe, by George Baker, one of tlie Queenes Majesties chief e Chirurgians 
in ordinary. London, Black Letter, 1599. 




No. 176. Distilling by the Sun's Heat 



382 Brazen Altars. [Book IV 

moisture within it, and rarefying the inward air unto so great an extension 
that it must needs seek for vent or issue, did thereby give several motions 
unto the instrument." (Math. Magic, Book ii, chap. 1.) 

Decaus, besides his explanation of the vocal statue of Egypt, has given 
a description of a musical summer, a device apparently similar to Dreb- 
ble's ; and in the twenty-second plate of his work he has figured another 
which Switzer has copied into his system of hydrostatics. 

The heat of the sun is too uncertain to be relied upon in those pro- 
jects that require immediate and certain results. During the evening, 
night, and early dawn, nothing could be effected ; and even in mid-day, 
clouds and showers often intercept or divert the rays : moreover a ma- 
chine when placed so as to be heated directly by the sun, soon experien- 
ces a diminution of its influence by the motion of the earth. Those rays 
which fall directly upon it becoming, in consequence of this motion, 
oblique. These and other unfavorable circumstances are common to most 
countries where the solar heat is sufficiently intense, while in others it is 
too feeble to be used with effect ; hence, in the temperate zones, within 
which the arts have at all times been chiefly cultivated, the application of 
ordinary fire has superseded, for nearly all practical purposes, that derived 
from the sun. In some parts of the earth saline waters are concentrated, 
and salt produced by the heat of the glowing orb of day, but for every 
thing like the devices belonging to our subject it is now seldom employed, 
if at all. 

The oldest applications of fire to raise liquids are, singularly enough, 
also to be found among the philosophical tricks of ancient priests, and 
among the prodigies which they performed at the altar itself. The selec- 
tion of altars for such displays was natural, because it was at them the will 
of the gods was more particularly expected to be made known. It must 
not be supposed that ancient altars were all simple structures of wood, 
stone, brick, or marble ; on the contrary, many of them were elaborately 
designed, and constructed entirely of metal. Every one knows that 
bronze or brazen altars are of frequent occurrence in the Old Testament, 
and the descriptions of some prove them to have been splendid specimens 
of workmanship and design. The altar for " burnt offerings," being up- 
wards of eight feet square and five deep, was covered with plates of 
brass. The grate, fire place, vessels, &c. were also of the same material. 
One of the numerous brazen altars built by Solomon was an extraordinary 
affair, being twenty cubits, or thirty-three feet square, and sixteen feet high. 
The large number of victims consumed on it and the necessary fires ac- 
count for these dimensions. 

As some of the most effectual frauds were consummated at and by 
means of altars, the civil governors of the heathen, and some of the worst 
princes of the Jews, made use of them for the performance of state tricks, 
to intimidate the people and subdue them to their will. In such matters 
a collusion between the priests and statesmen of antiquity is very obvi- 
ous. (By a similar combination of church and state it is that the people 
of Europe are still oppressed.) When Themistocles could not otherwise 
carry out his measures, he did not fail to make the oracles interfere. There 
are some interesting particulars in 2d of Kings, chap. xvi. respecting a 
brazen altar which Ahaz examined at Damascus, and an exact copy of 
which he had made and erected in Jerusalem. It evidently was of a no- 
vel construction and was probably designed for working pretended mira- 
cles for state purposes, for it was among those destroyed by his son He- 
zekiah. Montfaucon in the supplement to his antiquities describes some 
singular altars, and among others, one on which an eagle was made sud- 



Chap. 2.] Tricks performed at Altars hy means of Fire. 383 

denly to rise as in the act of flying away. This he observes was effected 
by machinery moved by a person appointed for the purpose. 

There are numerous intimations in history of frauds practiced at akars 
by fire, and by water and other liquids. We shall notice a few here, and 
others in the next chapter. A very ancient tradition taught that those 
were the greatest gods that answered their worshippers by fire. This 
was a prevailing belief among the ancient heathen, and hence the ingenuity 
of the priests was particularly exercised in devising means to produce a 
spontaneous or " divine fire," to consume the sacrifices. Servius, a Roman 
writer, affirms that in ancient times fire was never kindled on the altars, 
but was drawn down from heaven by prayers. Solinus another Roman 
author, who wrote in the first century, speaks of one in Sicily upon which 
the fuel, though ever so green, would kindle of itself if the sacrifice was 
acceptable to the gods. Pausanius relates an example of which he was 
a witness. Some of the devices are known. When the victim was laid on 
the altar and the fuel ready to be kindled, a libation of wine or oil was 
poured upon it ; streams of the liquid trickled through fissures or secret 
channels into a pan of coals concealed below, and instantly the sacrifice 
was enveloped in flames, and the desired proof of its acceptance given. 
At other times naptha, a mineral oil that takes fire on being exposed to the 
air, was adroitly dropt on the fuel by the priests as they officiated. This 
is the substance by which Medea is supposed to have destroyed Creusa, 
by impregnating with it the enchanted gown which she presented to her. 
When Creusa had put it on and was approaching the altar, it burst into 
flames, and she expired in excruciating torments. The Druids had the> 
art of kindling without fire a sulphurous substance by which they struck 
terror into their enemies. There are presumptive proofs that both they 
and the priests of Delphos had gunpowder, with which they imitated 
thunder and lightning ; and this accords with a remark of Pliny, in the 
second book of his Natural History, (chap. 53.) " It appeareth upon re- 
cord in chronicles that by certain sacrifices and prayers, lightnings may 
either be compelled or easily intreated to fall upon the earth." And he 
observes that there was an old tradition in Etruria, that lightning was 
procured "by exorcisms and conjurations." The ancient priests of Ethio- 
pia worshiped the sun, and at the close of harvest they separated a 
portion of the fruits from the rest as a sacrifice to the Deity : if the offer- 
ing was acceptable it instantly took fire. The Vestal iEmylia rekindled 
the sacred fire on the altar of Vesta, by putting her veil over it, that is, by 
some device which the act of adjusting her veil concealed : in fact enough 
is known to convince us that old temples were perfect laboratories. (See 
an expose of the pretended descent of celestial fire on G-ood Fridays, into 
the holy sepulchre of Jerusalem (which is, we believe, still kept up) in 
Motraye's Travels, vol. i, page 79.) 

But it was not by the sudden appearance of flames only that fire was 
employed as an agent of deception. Equally surprising effects, and as 
secretly produced, were derived from the heat which the fuel and burn- 
ing sacrifice gave out. It will readily be imagined that this heat must 
have been intense when a bullock, a sheep, or a goat, was consumed ; and 
sometimes several animals were offered at once upon the same altar. In 
burnt-offerings, every part was to be reduced to ashes, and hence particu- 
lar care was required that the fuel should be dry as well as in abundance ; 
otherwise the mass of flesh and juices might extinguish the fire — a circum- 
stance that was deemed very inauspicious. It was also customary to pour 
wine and oil upon the sacrifice, and spices and perfumes to correct the 
odor. These, of course, increased the heat, and in addition to which, it 



384 



Ancient Altar from Heron's Spiritalia. 



[Book IV 



appears from one of the Hamilton Vases, that large bellows were some 
times used to promote the combustion by a blast. 

A modern mechanician will at once perceive that the radiation of heat 
from such fires into the interior of altars offered an effective and unsuspi- 
cious source of fraud — one from which a distinct series of prodigies might 
be derived. Let us see how they could be realized. Suppose a bronze 
altar made air-tight, with a cylindrical or other opening through its centre, 
in which to place the fire and to afford a draft, (as in those wooden boilers 
in which water is heated by a fire in the centre ; the liquid being in con- 
tact with the heated sides of the furnace, and the ashes from the grate 
falling through the draft opening, which is continued through the bottom 
of the boilers) or the passage for the draft might be made at right angles 
to the furnace or fire-place, and terminate at one side of the altar; the up- 
per part of the furnace would then be level with the top of the altar upon 
which the victim was laid. Suppose the air-tight cavity round the fur- 
nace filled to a certain height with wine, oil, or other inflammable liquid, 
a vapor would then be evolved by the heat, and mixing with the contain- 
ed air would press upon the surface of the liquid, which, by concealed 
tubes might be conveyed to the fire and thus sustain it without any addi- 
tional fuel. The vapor might also be made to produce sounds as in Dreb- 
ble's machine — images of birds might by it be made to sing — dragons 
and serpents to hiss. The current, like the blast of a bellows, might be 
made to excite the flames ; and by appropriate mechanism impart motion 
to various automata — cause the doors of the temples mysteriously to fly 
open and to close, &c. &c. Now it so happens that these very things 
were done and by means of air and vapor. 

The annexed figure, from Problem XI, of the Spiritalia, will serve 
as a specimen of the ingenuity of the ancients in these respects. It is 
merely one of a number that Heron has given. The altar was of metal, 
hollow and air-tight, and placed on a hollow base or pedestal (also air- 
tight) which contained a quantity of oil or wine. Upon the base stood 

two statues, each holding a vase in 
one hand as represented. Pipes, as 
shown by the dotted lines, communi- 
cated through the statues with the 
liquid. As the air within the altar be- 
came dilated by the heat, it necessarily 
forced the liquid up the pipes and 
drove it out of the mouths of the va- 
ses in which the pipes terminated. It 
is not easy to see why the bottom of 
the altar did not open directly into the 
base or reservoir of wine, instead of 
the pipe that connects them, since it 
would have promoted the evolution 
of vapor; but the figure represents 
only one of the numerous modifica- 
tions employed. It is obvious from this and some other devices described 
by Heron, (as No. 173) that vapor from the contained liquids contributed 
chiefly to the result, although he has not in all cases mentioned it. Indeed 
it is not certain that he did not confound steam with air, as the philoso- 
phers of the sixteenth century did, of which some examples are given 
in the next two chapters. Had air alone been used in the above altar, 
the effect could only have have been momentary ; for part of it would 
be soon absorbed by the liquid and carried out with it, and there appears 




No. 177. 



Liquids raised by heat in ancient al- 
tars — from the Spiritalia. 



Chap. 2.] Ingenuity of Ancient Priests. 385 

no provision for a fresh supply. Besides, as the liquid was expelled, the 
higher would the remainder have to be raised, and consequently unless the 
air received a corresponding increase of temperature the discharge from 
the vase might cease. 

Had it not been for the Spiritalia, we should never have suspected that 
air was made to perform so important a part in ancient frauds, nor that 
its expansion and contraction had been employed to raise liquids. Not- 
withstanding the high opinion which history gives us of the philosophical 
knowledge of old priests, we should hardly have surmised that they had 
the art of applying this subtil fluid so ingeniously. They seem, however, 
to have ransacked all nature for devices ; and to have become familiar 
with the principles upon which the most valuable of our arts and ma- 
chinery are based. Astronomy, acoustics, chemistry, optics, hydrostatics, 
pneumatics, and hydraulics, were all pressed into their service. Even 
the application of steam, as a source of motive force, did not escape them ; 
so that had their energies been devoted to the development of useful me- 
chanism, the world would probably have been indebted to them for the 
steam engine itself. 

What wonders would an insight into the old temples have revealed ! 
To have had an opportunity of inspecting the machinery, new and old — 
to have been present at the consultations of the priests — witnessed their 
private experiments — heard them expatiate on the defects of this device 
and the perfect working of that — suggesting a wheel here and a spring 
there — to have been present at their consultations respecting the suspen- 
sion of water in Tutia's sieve, and witnessed the congratulations exchang -• 
ed at the eclat with which that and many other trials came off, &c. &c. — 
would have made us acquainted with discoveries both in science and 
mechanical combinations that would throw some modern inventions into 
shade : — But the tremendous evils which their impostures induced ren- 
dered concealment on the part of the priests indispensable. Exposure 
would not only have endangered their wealth and influence, but might 
have led to their extermination by an outraged and plundered people — 
hence the veil of religion was interposed to screen the operators and their 
apparatus, and inevitable death was the consequence of undue curiosity : 
witness that of Alcithas, a female of Thebes, who ridiculed the orgies of 
Bacchus, and was represented by the priests as having been changed into a 
bat ; a fiction of theirs, most likely, to conceal their having taken her off. 
JEpytus might be adduced as another example — he forcibly entered the 
temple of Neptune and was struck blind by a sudden eruption of salt-water 
from the altar ; probably sulphuric or other acid secretly ejected by the 
priests. In this chapter we have seen they had the means of doing this 
by the dilatation of air within the cavities of altars. 

We shall conclude this chapter with some remarks on the Spiritalia, 
a work that had more influence in reviving the study of hydrodynamics 
in modern times, than any other. This little book, like a rivulet, sent its 
streams of knowledge over all Europe in the sixteenth century. It 
stimulated, if it did not create that spirit of investigation and experimen- 
tal research which then commenced and has continued unimpaired to the 
present time. It seems to have caused an unusual degree of excitement. 
Philosophers, chemists, and physicians, as well as engineers, illustrated 
their writings by its problems and figures. Porta, Decaus, Fludd, and 
others, avowedly transferred its pages to their works, while many writers 
with less candor and less ingenuity made use of it without acknowledg- 
ment. Of all the old mechanicians, Besson seems to have been less in- 
debted to it than any other. 

49 



386 Contents of Heron's Spiritalia. [Book IV. 

The Spiritalia formed but a small part of the writings of Heron : had 
all of them reached our times, we should have possessed an almost per- 
fect system of ancient mechanical philosophy. He wrote books on 
clepsydra, automata, dioptrics, war machinery, engines for raising 
weights; and an introduction to mechanics, which is said to have been 
the most complete work on the subject which the ancients possessed. 
Taken as a whole, the Spiritalia seems more like the manual of an ancient 
magician than any thing else — a collection of deceptions with the pro- 
cesses by which they were matured. In it Heron, instead of appearing 
in the character of a philosopher, rather assumed (perhaps for amusement 
or to expose the frauds of the Egyptian hierarchy) that of a minister 
of Isis, initiating an acolyte into the mysteries of his profession. And 
numerous as are the devices described, they doubtless formed but a small 
part of those which constituted the active and efficient capital of the 
Egyptian priesthood. With the exception of an hydraulic and another 
organ, a syringe, fire engine, fountain of compression, three lamps and 
two eolipiles, (and most of which were also used for unworthy purposes) 
the whole may be considered as a text book for conjurers. Of the seventy- 
six problems contained in the book, twelve relate to the working of 
prodigies at the altars, by air dilated by the heat of the sacred fires, &c. 
as already noticed ; upwards of forty relate to sacrificial vases, Tantalus' 
cups, magic pitchers, &c. In some of these were concealed cavities, in 
which the liquid was retained or discharged, by closing with the thumb 
a minute opening in the handle. Water was poured into some and they 
'gave out wine, and vice versa. In these we have a solution of the trick 
by which water was changed into wine in the temple of Bacchus, on the 
7th of January at the annual feast of the god, as mentioned by Pliny. In 
others were disguised partitions forming various compartments in which 
different liquids were retained, and all discharged at one orifice (by a 
species of three or four-way cock) so that those in the secret could draw 
wine, oil, or water, at pleasure ; besides many other merry conceits, as the 
old authors name them. There is we think among them abundant evi- 
dence that our solution of Tutia's miracle of carrying water in a sieve 
was the true one. It is probable that in some of these vases, specimens of 
the old divining cups may be found. 

The ingenious reader will not repine at our inserting a specimen 
of a lustral vase. We have selected this because it shows that me- 
chanical as well as hydrodynamical devices were adopted as occasions 
required. It shows also that the mode of increasing or diminishing the 
pressure of a valve to its seat, by a loaded lever, as in the safety valve of 
a steam engine, was known — a circumstance that may be deemed quite in- 
significant by some persons ; but attention to such little things often 
enables us to arrive at correct estimates of an ancient device, and of the 
ingenuity and fertility of conception of ancient devisers. 

Most readers are aware that holy water was derived from that of the 
heathen. When a worshiper was about to enter the temple, he sprink- 
led himself from a vase of it placed near the entrance. On some particu- 
lar occasions the people were sprinkled by priests. (See an example at 
page 196.) Those who celebrated the Eleusinian mysteries were parti- 
cularly required to wash their hands in holy water. In the middle ages 
the liquid was a source of considerable profit to monks, and it was even 
a custom for clerks and scholars to hawk it for sale. From Heron's de- 
scription of the following figure, (No. 178,) we learn that heathen priests 
also made it a source of revenue ; the vessels containing lustral water not 
being always open for public use, free of charge, but closed, and like a 



Chap. 2.] 



Ancient Lustral Vase. 



387 




child's money box provided with a slit at the top, through which a certain 
sum was to be put before the donor could receive any of the purifying 
contents. In the vase before us five drachmce, or about seventy-five 
cents, were required, and it will be perceived from the construction of the 
apparatus that no less sum could procure a drop, although as much more 
might be put in as the donor thought proper* 
The device is a very neat specimen of religious 
ingenuity, and the more so since it required no 
attending minister to keep it in play. We 
may judge of other apparatus belonging to the 
old temples by the talent displayed in this. A 
portion of the vase is removed in the figure to 
show the interior. Near one side is seen a 
cylindrical vessel at A. It is this only that 
contained water. A small tube attached to the 
bottom is continued through the side of the vase 
at 0, where the liquid was discharged. The in- 
ner orifice of the tube was formed into the seat 
of a valve, the plug of which was fixed on the 
lower end of the perpendicular rod, whose up- 
per end was connected by a bolt to the hori- 
zontal lever or vibrating beam R. One end of 
R is spread out into a flat dish and so arranged 
as to receive on its surface every thing dropped through the slit. The 
lever turns on a pin or fulcrum very much like a pump handle, as re- 
presented. The operation will now be understood. As the weight of 
the rod kept the valve closed while nothing rested upon the broad end of 
the lever, so no liquid could escape ; but if a number of coins of sufficient 
weight were dropped through the slit upon the end of R, the valve 
would then be opened and a portion of liquid escape at o ; — the quantity 
flowing out would however be very small, not only from the contracted 
bore of the tube, but from the fact that the valve would be open only a 
moment ; for as. the lever became inclined from its horizontal position the 
pieces of money would slide off into the mass accumulated at H, and the 
efflux would as quickly be stopped : the apparatus would then be ready 
to supply the next customer on the same terms. This certainly was as 
simple and ingenious a mode of dealing out liquids as it was a profitable 
one, and after all was not half so demoralizing as the retailing of ardent 
spirits in modern times. 

One would suppose the publication of such a work as Heron's Spiri- 
talia must have been as distasteful to the occupants of ancient temples, 
as some of Luther's writings were to Leo X and his associates of the 
Vatican. 



No. 178. 



Ancient Vase of Lustral 
Water. 



a In spondea, hoc est in vasa sacrificii injecto quinque drachmarum numismate aqua 
ad inspergendum effluit. Spiritalia, xxi. 



388 On Steam. [Book IV. 



CHAPTER III 



On steam: Miserable condition of the great portion of the human race in past times — Brighter prospects 
for posterity— Inorganic motive forces — Wonders of steam — Its beneficial influence on man's future destiny 
— Will supersede nearly all human drudgery — Progress of the arts — Cause why steam was not formerly 
employed — Pots boiling over and primitive experiments by females — Steam an agent in working prodi- 
gies — Priests familiar with steam — Sacrifices boiled — Seething bones — Earthquakes — Anthemius and 
Zeno — Hot baths at Rome — Ball supported on a jet of steam, from the Spiritalia — Heron's whirling 
eolipile — Steam engines on the same principle — Eolipiles described by Vitruvius — Their various uses — 
Heraldic device — Eolipiles from Rivius — Cupelo furnace and eolipile, from Erckers — Similar applica- 
tions of steam revived and patented — Eolipiles of the human form — Ancient tenures — Jack of Hilton — 
Puster, a steam deity of the ancient Germans — Ingenuity of the priests in constructing and working it — 
Supposed allusions to eolipilic idols in the bible — Employed in ancient wars to project streams of liquid 
fire— Draft of chimneys improved, perfumes dispersed, and music produced by eolipiles — Eolipiles the 
germ of modern steam engines. 



If we contemplate the past history of man, we shall find that, with a 
few insignificant exceptions, the entire race has been, as it were, doomed 
to support an existence surcharged with misery. From the earliest pe- 
riods of recorded time, we behold the great mass slaves to an organized 
despotism which a few crafty spirits entailed upon the species — a despo- 
tism both mental and physical — to subdue the body and enthrall the mind 
— political and ecclesiastical despotism. To the neglect of mental cultiva- 
tion alone, these evils are to be attributed ; for in every age men have had 
the same elements of prosperity and of happiness. The earth and its 
treasures have always been at their disposal, and the natural capacities of 
the human intellect, have probably always been the same. It is the im- 
provement of these capacities by culture, and their degeneracy by neglect, 
that make all the differences in men's condition. The horrible sufferings 
of the myriads of human beings who have passed through a life of un- 
ceasing and unrequited toil, were owing to their ignorance, and hence the 
tyrants of the earth have always labored, and still labor, to keep those 
uninformed that are subject to their sway. Ignorance was the grand en- 
gine by which the most atrocious systems of tyranny, superstition and 
magic were established in ancient times ; and whose influences are not 
yet done away. 

But within the last two centuries a new era has opened with brighter 
prospects for the human family at large, than has ever yet dawned upon 
it. An era that has been ushered in by the discovery, or rather applica- 
tion, of a new motive agent, viz. steam. The wonderful effects which 
this fluid has been made to produce, are so creditable to the human intel- 
lect, and so fraught with consequences of the highest import to our 
race in all times to come, as to excite even in the most torpid minds 
emotions of stirring interest. Steam is changing every thing, and every 
thing for .the better. It has opened new sources of social and indi- 
vidual happiness : nor is its influence confined to the physical condi- 
tion of man, for by its connection with the manufacture of paper and with 
the printing press, it has done more to rouse and exercise the moral and 



Chap. 3.] Future Destiny of Man. 389 

intellectual energies of our nature than any thing else ; and has imparted 
a vigorous impulse to them, as well as to the useful arts. As all the ad- 
vantages derived in modern times from steam originated in attempts to 
raise water by it, we need offer no apology for indulging in some preli- 
minary remarks. 

What a proof is steam of the stores oi motive forces that are to be found 
in the inorganic world ! Forces that can render us incalculable service, 
if we would but open our eyes to detect, and exercise our energies to 
employ them. Who could have supposed two centuries ago, that the sim- 
ple vapor of water would ever be used as a substitute for human exertions, 
and should relieve man from a great portion of the physical toil under 
which he has groaned from the beginning of the world % That it would 
arm him with a power which is irresistible, and at the same time the most 
pliant — one that can uproot a mountain, and yet be controlled by a child ! 
Who could have then imagined that a vessel of boiling water should im- 
part motion to machinery in every department of the arts, and be 
equally adapted to all — should spin and weave threads fine as those of the 
gossamer ; and forge tons of iron into single bars with almost equal rapi- 
dity and ease — raise water from mines, in streams equal to rivers ; and 
extract mountains of mineral from the bowels of the earth — should 
propel carriages, such as no horses could move, with the velocity of wind ; 
and urge ships of every class through the ocean, in spite both of winds 
and waves — should be the means of circulating knowledge at the price of 
waste paper, and of awakening and stimulating the mental capacities 
of men ! In a word, that a little aqueous vapor should revolutionize the 
whole social and political condition of man : and that after having done 
all this, that it should probably give place to other agents, still more 
powerful and beneficial, which science and observation should discover. 

What a proof is steam of the high destiny that awaits our species! 
The most fervid imagination cannot realize the importance of those disco- 
veries in science and the arts, of which it is. merely the forerunner ; the 
first in that new catalogue of motive agents that are ordained to change 
the condition of men, and to regenerate the earth ; for all that is yet done 
is but as the twilight that ushers in the orb of day. Hitherto man has 
been comparatively asleep, or in a state resembling it — insensible of the 
rich inheritance which the Creator has placed at his disposal in the elas- 
tic fluids, and of their adaptation to impart motion to every species of me- 
chanism. How few persons are aware that the grand invention of 
imparting motion to a piston by steam and other elastic fluids, is the pivot 
on which the chief affairs of the world is destined hereafter to turn % 
And the time is not distant when, by means of it, the latent energy of the 
gases, or other properties of inert matter, will supersede, in a great de- 
gree, the drudgery of man — will perform nearly all the labor which the 
bones and sinews of our species have hitherto been doomed to accomplish. 
There are persons, however, whose minds biased by the eternal bondage 
in which the mass of our race has always been held, who will startle 
at the idea of the whole becoming an intelligent and highly intellectual 
body. They cannot conceive how the affairs of life are to be continued 
— the execution of innumerable works which the constitution of society 
requires should be performed, if these helots become free. But can they, 
can any one, seriously believe that the all-wise and benevolent Creator 
could possibly have intended that the highest class of beings which he 
has placed on this planet — the only one capable of appreciating his 
works and realizing correct ideas of his attributes — that the great por- 
tion of these, should pass through life in incessantly toiling for mere 



390 Benefits to be derived from Steam. [Book IV. 

food ; — and undergoing privations and sufferings to obtain it, from which 
the lowest animals are exempt 1 Assuredly not. Had such been his 
design, he would not have created them with faculties expressly adapted 
for nobler pursuits. 

It is the glory of modern science, that it calls into legitimate use 
both the physical and mental powers of man. It rewards him with nu- 
merous forces derived from inanimate nature, and instructs him in the 
application of them, to all, or nearly all, the purposes of life ; and even- 
tually it will require from him no greater amount of physical toil, than 
what conduces to the full development of all the energies of his com- 
pound nature. It is destined to awaken that mass of intellect which has 
hitherto lain dormant, and been all but buried in the laboring classes ; 
and to bring it into active exercise for the benefit of the whole. And for 
aught we know, the " new earth" spoken of in the scriptures, may refer 
to that state of society, when science has thus relieved man from all inju 
rious labor — when he will walk erect upon the earth and subdue it, 
rather by his intellect than by the sweat of his brow — when the curse of 
ignorance will be removed, and with it the tremendous punishment that 
has ever attended it. Then men will no longer enter in shoals into a new 
state of existence in another world, as utterly ignorant of the wonders of 
creative wisdom in this, as if they had never been in it, and had not pos- 
sessed faculties expressly adapted to study and enjoy them. 

There is no truth in the observation of some people, that all discoveries 
of importance are already made ; on the contrary, the era of scientific 
research and the application of science to the arts may be considered as 
but commenced. The works of creation will forever furnish materials for 
the exercise of the most refined intellects, and will reward their labors 
with a perpetual succession of new discoveries. The progress which has 
been made in investigating the laws that govern the aqueous, atmospheri- 
cal, mineral and vegetable parts of creation, is but a prelude to what is 
yet to be done — it is but the clearing of the threshold preparatory to the 
portals of the temple of science being thrown open to the world at large. 
There is no profession however matured, no art however advanced, that 
is not capable of further improvement ; or that, so far as we can tell, will 
not always be capable of it. If an art be carried to the utmost perfection 
it is capable of in one age, discoveries in others will in time be made, by 
means of which it will be still further advanced ; for every improvement 
in one has an effect, more or less direct, on every other. 

The benefits already derived from steam, then, are but as a drop to 
the ocean when compared with those that posterity will realize ; for if 
such great things have been accomplished by it in one century, what may 
not be expected in another % and another % It has been calculated that 
two hundred men, with machinery moved by steam, now manufacture as 
much cotton as would require twenty millions of persons without ma- 
chines; that is, one man by the application of inorganic motive agents can 
now produce the same amount of work that formerly required one hun- 
dred thousand men. The annual product of machinery in Great Britain, 
a mere spot on the earth, would require the physical energies of one half 
the inhabitants of the globe, or four hundred millions of men : and the 
various applications of steam in different parts of the world now produce 
an amount of useful labor, which if performed by manual strength would 
require the incessant exertions of every human being. Hence this great 
amount of labor is so much gained, since it is the result of inorganized 
forces, and consequently contributes so much to the sum of human happi- 
ness. Now if such results have been brought about so quickly and by 



Chap. 3.] Primitive Experiments with Steam. 391 

steam alone, what may not be expected from it, and other aeriform fluids, 
in ages to come, when the progressive improvement of every art and 
every science shall have brought to light not only other agents of the kind, 
but more efficient means of employing them % There is no end to the 
beneficial applications of the gases as motive agents, and no limits to the 
power to be derived from them. As long as rain falls or rivers* flow — 
while trees (for fuel) grow, or mineral coal is found, man can thus wield 
a power that renders him almost omnipotent. 

The question may be asked, why was not the elastic force of steam 
earlier used as a source of motive power ] Because, as we observed be- 
fore, men neglected to employ those powers of reflection and invention 
which God had given them. It certainly formed no part of the Creator's 
plan of governing the world that they should have so long remained ig- 
norant of its application. He has placed man at the head of creation and 
furnished him with powers appropriate to his position. Every object in 
nature he can use for good or for evil. They are the materials from 
which he may, as an expert machinist, fabricate at will all that his wants 
require : he may prostitute them to the miseries of himself and his fel- 
lows ; or he may neglect them to the injury of all. It is the order of 
nature that her latent resources shall be discovered and applied by diligent 
research. Hence some of the finest specimens of the Creator's wisdom 
can only be appreciated after careful study, a fact which is itself a proof 
of his wisdom and beneficence, since their realization is thus held out 
as an inducement to investigate them. 

Steam has of course been noticed ever since the heating of water and 
boiling of victuals were practiced. The daily occurrence implied by the 
expression " the pot boils over" was as common in antediluvian as in mo- 
dern times ; and hot water thus raised was one of the earliest observed 
facts connected with the evolution of vapor. From allusions in the most 
ancient writings, we may gather that the phenomena exhibited by steam 
were closely observed of old. Thus Job in describing Leviathan alludes 
to the puffs or volumes that issue from under the covers of boiling vessels. 
" By his neesings a light doth shine, and his eyes are like the eyelids of 
the morning ; out of his nostrils goeth smoke [steam] as out of a seething 
pot or cauldron." In the early use of the vessels last named, and before 
experience had rendered the management of them easy and safe, females 
would naturally endeavour to prevent the savory contents of their pots 
from flying off in vapor; hence attempts to confine it by covers; and 
when these did not fit sufficiently close, a cloth or some similar substance 
interposed between it and the edge of the vessel, would readily occur ; 
and a stone or other weight placed upon the top to keep all tight would 
also be very natural. Then as the fluid began again to escape, further 
efforts would be made to retain it by additional weights. In this manner, 
doubtless many a contest was kept up between a pot and its owner, till 
one gained the victory ; and we need not the testimony of historians to 
determine which this was. In those times it was not generally known 
that a boiling cauldron contained a spirit, impatient of control — that the 
vessel was the generator of an irresistible power, and the cover a safety- 
valve ; and that the preservation of the contents and the security of 
the operator depended upon letting the cover alone, or not overloading 
it : — hence it no doubt often happened that the confined vapor threw out 
the contents with violence, and then it was that primitive cooks began to 
perceive that there was death as well as life in a boiling pot. In this 
manner, we suppose females were the first experimenters on steam, and 
the earliest witnesses of steam boiler explosions. 



392 Ancient Tricks performed by Steam. [Book IV 

The domestic exhibitions of the force of steam must have excited the 
attention of mechanicians in every age, nor could its capabilities of over- 
coming resistances opposed to it, have escaped them. Thus we find that 
experimenters are almost always said to have derived the first hint from 
a culinary vessel : hence the Marquis of Worcester, according to a tradi- 
tion, had his attention drawn to the use of this fluid to raise water, by 
witnessing, while a prisoner in the Tower of London, the lid of a boiler 
thrown off by the vapor — but the anecdote is of much older date, and 
was applied to many others before his time as well as since. Vitruvius 
illustrates his views respecting the appearance of springs on mountains, 
by a cauldron which, he says, when two thirds filled with water and heat- 
ed by the fire, " communicates the heat to the water ; and this on account 
of its natural porosity, receiving a strong inflation from the heat, not only 
fills the vessel, but swelling with the steam and raising the cover, over- 
flows," &c. (Book viii, chap. 3.) Such occurrences are nature's hints, 
by attention to which important discoveries have always been made. 
Even when people in former times were injured by the explosion of a 
cauldron, the misfortune should have been considered as an indication of 
nature to employ the force thus developed — and also as a punishment 
for having neglected to do so. Nay, we don't see why such occurrences 
may not, in this view of them, be considered providential, as well as simi- 
lar ones, which theological writers avail themselves of, to establish a 
similar doctrine. 

There are intimations that the elastic force of steam was employed by 
several people of antiquity, but the details of its application are unfortu- 
nately not known. Some relics of its use, as well as that of heated air, 
are to be found in the deceptions practiced by the heathen priesthood. Its 
application for similar purposes was continued till comparatively modern 
times, for it was the animating principle in the eolipilic idols of the middle 
ages ; and, from an incidental notice of some experiments of a Greek archi- 
tect, it is probable that the trembling of the earth, and other horrors expe- 
rienced by those who were initiated into the greater mysteries of ancient 
worship, were also effected by steam. Artificial thunder, lightning from 
the vapor of inflammable liquids, and unearthly music, were produced by 
its means. Some of the tricks performed by the Pythoness and her co- 
adjutors at Delphos seemed to have been matured by it. The famous 
tripod against which she leaned is represented as a brazen vessel from 
which a miraculous vapor arose. Steam was one of the agents of decep- 
tion in trials of ordeal. Those persons condemned to undergo that of 
boiling water, were protected by the priests (when it was their interest 
or inclination to do so) by admitting a concealed stream of steam into the 
lower part of the cauldron containing tepid water — the consequent agita- 
tion of the liquid and the ascent of the vapor that escaped condensation 
presented to the ignorant and unsuspecting beholders every appearance 
of genuine ebullition. On similar occasions air was forced through the 
liquid in the dark ages. 

Ancient priests, both among the Jews and heathen, were from their 
ordinary duties necessarily conversant with the generation of steam. Its 
elastic force could not therefore escape the shrewd observers among them. 
Sacrifices were frequently boiled in huge cauldrons, several of which were 
permanently fixed in the vicinity of temples — in " the boiling places" as 
their locations are named by Ezekiel, " where the ministers of the house 
shall boil the sacrifice of the people." (See an example from Herodotus 
at page 200.) It would seem moreover as if some of the boilers were 
made on the principle of Papin's Digester, in which bones were softened 



Chap. 3.] Anthemius and Zeno. 393 

by * high, steam' — at any rate a distinction is made between seething pots 
and cauldrons, and from the manner in which both are mentioned they 
seem to have been designed for different purposes ; the former to seethe 
or soften bones, the latter to boil the flesh in only. " They roasted the 
' passover with fire, but the other offerings sod they in pots and in caul- 
drons." (2 Chr. chap, xxxv, 13.) " Set on a pot, set it on, and also 
pour water into it. Gather the pieces thereof into it, even every good 
piece, the thigh and the shoulder ; fill it with the choice bones. Take 
the choice of the flock and burn [or heap] also the bones under it, and make 
it boil well, and let them seethe the bones of it therein." (Ezek. xxiv. 3, 5.) 
Tlpa opinion of the Jews having close vessels in which steam was raised 
higher than in common cauldrons is also rendered probable from the fact 
that the Chinese, a contemporary people, employ similar ones, and which 
from their tenacity to ancient devices have probably been used by them 
from times anterior to those of the prophet. (Davis' Chinese, ii, 271. 
John Bell's Travels, i, 296 and ii, 13.) 

Similar processes have been common with chemists in all ages, in the 
making of extracts, and sometimes in preparing food. There is an ex- 
ample in Porta's Natural Magic. He tells us (in the xiii chap, on distil- 
lation) that he has restored persons at the point of death to health by " an 
essence extracted out of flesh." He directs three capons to be dressed 
and boiled " a whole day in a glass vessel close stopt, until the bones and 
flesh and all the substance be dissolved into liquor." 

Some of the ancient philosophers, who were close observers of nature, 
compared the earth to a cauldron, in which water is heated by internal 
fires ; and they explained the phemonena of earthquakes by the accumu- 
lation of steam in subterraneous caverns, until its elastic energy rends the 
superincumbent strata for a vent. Vitruvius explains by it the existence 
of boiling springs. In the reign of Justinian, Anthemius, an architect and 
mathematician illustrated several natural phenomena by it ; but of this we 
should probably never have heard, had it not been for a quarrel between 
him and his next door neighbor, Zeno, the rhetorician. This orator 
appears to have inherited a considerable share of credulity and supersti- 
tion, which gave his antagonist the advantage. Anthemius, we are in- 
formed, had several steam boilers in the lower part of his house, from 
each of which a pipe conveyed the vapor above, and by some mechanism, 
of which no account has been preserved, he shook the house of his enemy 
as by a real earthquake, upon which the frightened Zeno rushed to the 
senate " and declared in a tragic style that a mere mortal must yield to 
the power of an antagonist who shook the earth with the trident of 
Neptune." 

There are reasons for believing that the expansive force of the steam 
which was evolved in heating the immense volumes of water for the hot 
baths at Rome, was employed to elevate and discharge the contents of the 
boilers. Sir W. Gell has given, in his Pompeiana, a representation of a 
set of cauldrons belonging to the Thermae, at Pompeii, derived from im- 
pressions left in the mortar or cement in which they were embedded. It 
would seem that several series or sets were used, each consisting of three 
close boilers (in shape not unlike modern stills,) placed directly upon, and 
connected by pipes to each other. The manner in which they were con- 
nected is not known; Gell says by a species of siphon. The lowest 
boiler was the largest and was placed directly over the furnace ; and the 
arrangement was such, that when any part of the boiling liquid was with- 
drawn, an equal quantity, already warmed, entered from the next boiler 
above, which at the same time derived a supply from the uppermost one ; 

50 



394 



Eolipiles, from Heron. 



[Book IV. 



this is to be regretted because 
of the hot baths at Rome, the operations ~ 
water must have been conducted on a scale far more 



& apparatus and those connected 

>een ascer- 

and magnitude 

D 



this last being always kept filled by a pipe from the aqueduct or castel- 

lum. Remains of the pipes, cocks, copper flues, &c. have been found in 

abundance, but the details of the heatin 

with the elevation and distribution of the liquid have not 

tained : this is to be regretted because, from the number 

of boiling" and dispersing the 
extensive than any 
thing in modern times — the most extensive breweries and distilleries 
not excepted. Some idea of the operations may be derived from the fact 
that a single establishment could accommodate two thousand persons with 
warm, or rather hot, baths at the same time. Seneca, in a letter to Lu^i- 
Hus, says " there is no difference between the heat of the baths and a 
boiling furnace ;" and it would, he observes, appear to a reasonable man 
as a sufficient punishment to wash a condemned criminal in them. The 
persons who had the charge of heating in close vessels and distributing 
daily such large quantities of water, must necessarily have been conver- 
sant with the mechanical properties of steam, and with economical modes 
of generating it. In some cases the water was heated by passing through 
a coiled copper tube, like a distiller's worm, which was embedded in lire. 
We have previously remarked that the Romans also heated water by 
making it pass through the hollow grates of a furnace. (See Pompeii, 
vol. i, 196, and G-ell's Pompeiana.) 

Besides the various applications of heated air and of vapor already 
noticed, there is in problem XLV of Heron's Spintalia, a description of 
a close boiler, from the upper part of which a current issues that supports 
at some distance above the boiler a light ball like those that are made to 
play on jets of water. (See the annexed figure, No. 179.) The whir- 
ling eolipile, No. 180, is the subject of problem L — and is the earliest 
representation of a machine moved by steam that is extant. It consists 

of a small hollow sphere, from 
Eolipiles, from Heron. which t wo short tubes proceed 

in the line of its axis, and whose 
ends are bent in opposite direc- 
tions. The sphere is suspend- 
ed between two columns, their 
upper ends being pointed and 
bent towards each other. One 
of these columns was hollow and 
conveyed steam from the boiler 
into the sphere, and the escape 
of the vapor from the small 
tubes by its reaction imparted a 
revolving motion to the sphere. 
These two applications of steam 
have been considered the result 
of a fortunate random thought, 
which Heron, or some other old 
mechanic, stumbled on by a species of chance medley, whereas they cer- 
tainly indicate an intimate though it may be a limited acquaintance with 
the mechanical properties of that fluid. We should never suppose that 
this elegant application of the jet to sustain a ball in the air was the fruit 
of a first attempt to use steam, much less that the complex movement of 
the whirling eolipile was another thought of the moment. Did any 
modern experimenter in hydraulics ever hit upon the suspension of a ball 
by a jet of water in his first essays, or devise Barker's mill at a sitting, 




No. n< 



No. 180. 



Chap. 3.] Eolipiles described by Vitruvius. 395 

without having ever heard of either % No more than any old mechanician 
ever invented the above before experimental researches on steam had be- 
came familiar to him, if not to his contemporaries. Besides, there have 
been within the last half century not less than half a dozen patents taken 
out for rotary steam engines identical in principle with the whirling 
eolipile. The fact seems to be that Heron selected the two devices 
above, on the same principle as the rest of the illustrations, i. e. such as 
in his judgment would be the most interesting* 

From a remark of Vitruvius in the first book of his Architecture, chap. 6, 
we learn that those portable steam machines named Eolipiles, (from Eolus 
the god of wind, and their application to create artificial winds) were in 
common use in his time. Speaking of the town of Mytilene, he observes 
that the inhabitants were subject to colds, in those seasons when cer- 
tain winds blew ; and which might have been in some degree avoided 
by a more proper disposition of the streets. " Wind, [he remarks] is only 
a current of air, flowing with uncertain motion ; — it arises from the action 
of heat upon moisture — the violence of the heat forcing out the blasts of 
air. That this is the fact, the brass eolipiles make evident ; — for the op- 
erations of the heavens and nature may be discovered by the action of 
artificial machines. These brass eolipiles are hollow and have a very nar- 
row aperture, by which they are filled with water, and then placed on the 
fire : — before they become hot, they emit no effluvia, but as soon as the water 
begins to boil, they send forth a vehement blastP As these instruments 
have been adapted to a great variety of purposes, as well as being inti- 
mately connected with this part of our subject, we shall notice them with 
some detail. From the times of Vitruvius to those of Des Cartes, and up 
to the present century, they have been used as philosophical instruments 
to illustrate the nature of winds and meteors, as well as for other scien- 
tific pursuits. They were used as substitutes for bellows in blast furna- 
ces and ordinary fires. The draft of chimneys was increased by means 
of them. They were made to produce music and disperse perfumes. 
They constituted the distilling vessels of the alchymists, and in another 
form were employed as weapons of war, and were even deified in the 
steam idols of old. They were the first instruments employed to raise 
water by steam, and the first to produce motion by it ; and hence they 
constitute the germ of modern steam engines, to which we may add that 
they led to the invention of steam guns. (See Martin's Philosophy, vol. 
ii, 90.) They are commonly made of iron, brass, or strong copper, hav- 
ing a short neck in which a very minute opening is made. In order to 
charge one with water (or other liquid) it is placed on a fire until nearly 
red hot ; it is then taken off, and the neck placed in water or the whole 
plunged in it, which, as the vessel cools, takes the place of the air driven 
out by the heat. It is then placed on a brazier of charcoal or other fire 
until steam is rapidly evolved and discharged with violence at the orifice. 

Vitruvius has not mentioned the particular purposes for which eolipiles 
were used by the Romans. It is however known that they were em- 
ployed as bellows for exciting fires ; and as this was not for want of the 
latter instruments, they must have had properties which rendered them 

a Balls dancing on jets of water and air, were a favorite accompaniment of the old 
garden water works, and hydraulic organs, &c. of Italy, where the device has probably 
been in use since the times of the Republic : the amusement of children with peas on 
the ends of tobacco pipes or reeds is in imitation of it : the current of air blown 
through the perpendicular tube keeps the tiny globe some inches above the orifice, 
where its motions, varying with the force of the current, produce a very agreeable 
effect. 



396 Eolipiles from Rivius and Cardan. [Book IV 

preferable, on some occasions, to bellows. One perhaps was their occu- 
pying little room on the hearth ; and another, their requiring no attendant 
to keep up the blast. It has already been observed (page 237-8,) that 
human bellows-blowers formed part of the large domestic establishments 
in ancient Egypt, and Nos. 103 and 104 of our illustrations represent 
some at work in one of the kitchens of the Pharaohs. The practice was 
probably common among all the celebrated nations of old, and we know 
that it was continued in Europe till the sixteenth century if not later. 
To supersede these workmen might therefore have been one reason for 
the employment of eolipiles. 

In a Latin collection of " Emblems human and divine" (Prague, 1601,) 
there is a device of one of the old Counts of Hapsburg, which consists 
of a blowing eolipile with a stream of vapor issuing from it, and the 
motto Jjcbsus Juvo. (Vol. ii, 372.) The same device is also given in a 
treatise on Heroic Symbols, Antwerp, 1634. Hence this ancient domes- 
tic instrument was adopted on such occasions as well as the bellows, 
syringe, watering pot, &c. 

Rivius in commenting on the eolipiles mentioned by Vitruvius describes 
those in use in his own time, (A. D. 1548,) and gives several figures, from 
which we have selected the first three of the following ones. 

Eolipiles, from Rivius and Cardan. 




No. 181. No. 182. No. 183. No. 184. 

Rivius names them " wind holders" and " fire blowers." He says they 
were made in various shapes and of different materials, and were used 
"to blow the fire like a pair of bellows." Some, designed for other pur- 
poses, that will presently be mentioned, were made of gold or silver and 
richly ornamented, as represented above. At a subsequent period of the 
sixteenth century, Cardan gave a figure of one. (See No. 184.) Fludd, 
Porta and other old writers also describe them. The latter, in book xix, 
chap. 3, of his Natural Magic, speaks of them as used in houses to blow 
fires. Sir Hugh Platte, in 1594, published a figure and description of 
" a rounde ball of copper, or latton [brass] that blows the fyre verie 
stronglie by the attenuation of the water into ayre." 

Bishop Wilkins, in his Mathematical Magic, (published in 1648) speaks 
of eolipiles as then common. They are made, he observes, "of some 
such material as may endure the fire, having a small hole, at which they 
are filled with water, and out of which (when the vessels are heated) the 
air doth issue forth with a strong and lasting violence. These are fre- 
quently used for the exciting and contracting of heat in the melting of 
glasses or metals. They may also be contrived to be serviceable for sun- 
dry other pleasant uses, as for the moving of sails in a chimney corner, 
the motion of which sails may be applied to the turning of a spit, or the 
like." (Book ii, chap. \.) Kircher has given a figure of an eolipile 
turning a joint of meat, (as indicated by the Bishop) in the first volume 




Chap. 3.] Smelting Ore with the blast of an Bolipile. 397 

of his Mundus Subterraneus, page 203.) We do not remember to have 
met with a figure of an eolipile applied to the fusing of glass or metal, 
except in the Aula Subterranea of Lazarus Erckers (or Erckern) on Me- 
tallurgy, published in German, in 1672, and which, like that of Agricola, 
is illustrated with numerous cuts. The author was superintendent of the 
mines of Hungary, Germany, and the Tyrol, under three Emperors, and 
his work is said to contain every thing necessary to be known in the 
assaving of metals. The annexed figure is copied from the 'fifth edition, 

(with notes) published at Frankfort on 
the Mayn, in 1736. It is named Bine 
tupfferne kugel darinn wasser ist, wird 
ubersfeuer gesekt, und an statt Bines 
blas-balgs gebraacht, and is represented 
as smelting copper ore in a cupelo fur- 
nace. Erckers has figured it twice — 
at pages 1 and 136. 

It is not a little singular that this 
mode of increasing the intensity of 
fires by a jet of steam directed into the 
burning fuel has recently been patent- 
ed both in this country and Europe. 
It does not however appear to have 
answered the expectations formed of 
it, since it has never come into general 
use, nor are we aware that it is at 
No. 185. smeitiigOTe with the blast of an present employed at all. Two obvi- 
ous discrepancies between ancient and 
modern applications of steam for such purposes may here be noticed, since 
they will, we think, account for the failure of the latter : one is in the 
nature of the fuel — the other in the temperature of the blast. In the old 
eolipiles, the steam, having but a very minute passage through which to 
escape, was raised to a temperature which far exceeded that which is 
generated in ordinary steam engine boilers — the vapor was perfectly in- 
visible, and its escape only known by the sound of the blast, and its effect 
on the fire. But in late experiments the current consisted of steam loaded 
with moisture — a mass of aqueous globules poured into the fire, instead of 
the rarefied and glowing aura that rushed with such impetuous velocity 
from eolipiles. The powerful effect of the latter on fires of wood and 
charcoal is unquestionable, but the results of similar blasts on other kinds 
of fuel (as stone coal) has not yet we believe been sufficiently ascertained. 
Another difference consisted in the dimensions of the volumes of the 
blasts : — the one from the eolipile was small and compact — that of the 
other large and diffuse, a circumstance that may account still further for 
the different results; for it should be remembered that in using an eolipile 
it is not the jet of steam alone that is impelled against the burning fuel, 
but a volume of atmospheric air is set in motion by the blast and carried 
into the fire along with it : the same thing takes place in using a common 
bellows, more air being forced against the fire than what issues from the 
nozzle ; and hence as the velocity of the jet from an eolipile was much 
greater and the jet itself smaller than those of modern applications of 
steam for the same purpose, a much larger proportion of air was also 
borne along with it. It is probable that on particular occasions the an- 
cients filled them with oil or spirituous liquors instead of water, in order 
to promote a more rapid combustion. 

The idea of increasing the heat of fires by water is very old. Pliny 



398 Ancient Tenures, [Book IV. 

says that charcoal which has been wetted gives out more heat than that 
which is always kept dry. (Nat. Hist. B. xxxiii, cap. 5.) Dr. Fryer 
speaks of " water cast on sea coal" rendering the heat more intense. 
(Travels, Lon. 1698, p. 290.) 

If there was no evidence that eolipiles had been moulded into various 
shapes of men, animals, &c. we might have concluded that such was the 
fact from what is known of the practice of the ancients. Whenever the 
design, action or movement of a machine or implement corresponded at 
all with those of men, it was sure to resemble them in form, if its use could 
possibly admit of it. The taste for such things was universal in former 
times, and is to a certain extent indulged in all times. It seems inhe- 
rent in savage people; hence their grotesque and monstrous statues or idols, 
speaking heads and other androidii of the old mechanics. There has in 
fact always been a predominating disposition to imitate the human form; 
and in accordance with it, eolipiles were made to assume the figures of 
men, boys, &c. the blast escaping from the eyes, mouth, or other parts of 
the figure. Even so late as the seventeenth century we are told that " to 
render eolipiles more agreeable, they commonly make them in the form 
of a head, with a hole at the mouth." (Ozanam's Mathematical and Phy- 
sical Recreatiorts, English translation, London, 1708, 419.) It was in- 
deed natural that these machines should be made to resemble figures of 
the god from whom they were named. An old one is described in the 
Encyclopedia of Antiquities as " made in the shape of a short fat man 
with very slender arms, in a curious wig, cheeks extremely swollen, a 
hole behind for filling it, and a small one at the mouth for the blast." 

Most readers are aware that tenures by which lands were held in the 
middle ages were often based on the most trifling and ridiculous consi- 
derations. Camden has noticed a great number in his Brittannia, and in 
the description of the county of Suffolk, there is one which seems to have 
had reference to the employment of an eolipile ; but whether it had or not, 
there is in Dr. Plott's History of Shropshire an account of one of these 
"merry tenures" in which blowing the fire with an eolipile formed part 
of the duty required. The instrument was of the human form and de- 
signated, like many other domestic utensils, by the soubriquet " Jack." 
" Jack of Hilton, a little hollow image of brass, about twelve inches high, 
with his right hand on his head and his left on pego," blows the fire in 
Hilton-hall every new year's day, while the Lord of Essington drives a 
goose three times round it, before it is to be roasted and eaten by the 
Lord of Hilton or his deputy. In some accounts it is stated that the 
image blew the fire while the goose was roasting, which is more proba 
ble than the other. The custom is supposed to have been continued at 
Hilton-hall from the tenth or eleventh to the seventeenth century. This 
image is considered by some writers as an ancient idol. 

From the above use of eolipiles it will be perceived that there is a 
similar analogy between them and machines to raise water by steam, as 
between pumps and bellows ; every device for blowing a fire having oeen 
used to raise liquids. 

It will readily be imagined that these blowing images offered too many 
advantages to escape being pressed into the secret services of the temples, 
even supposing they did not originate in them. By charging the interior 
with different fluids the results could be varied according to circum- 
stances, and if an inflammable liquid was employed, as oil, spirits of wine, 
turpentine, &c. &c. streams and flashes of fire could be made to shoot 
from any or every part of the figure. Enough is known to convince us 
that such things were often done. Notwithstanding all the care of the 



Cap. 3.] Puster, a Steam Deity of the Germans. 399 

old priests to conceal, and when concealment was impracticable to des- 
troy their apparatus, some specimens of their machinery have come down. 
In the fifteenth or early part of the sixteenth century, an eolipilic idol of 
the ancient Germans was found in making some excavations, and is we 
believe still extant. A figure of it is inserted in the second volume of 
Montfaucon's Antiquities. It is made of a peculiar species of bronze and 
is between three and four feet in height, and the body two and a half in 
circumference. Its appearance is very uncouth. It is without drapery, 
with one knee on the ground, the right hand on the head, and the left, 
which is broken off, rested upon the thigh. The cavity for the liquid 
holds about seven gallons, and there are two openings for the escape of 
the vapor, one at the mouth and the other in the forehead. These 
openings were stopped with plugs of wood, and the priests had secret 
means of applying the fire. It appears from Weber and other German 
writers on the subject that this idol was made to express various passions 
of the deity it represented, with a view to extort offerings and sacrifi- 
ces from the deluded worshippers ; and that the liquid was inflammable. 
When the demands of the priests were not complied with, the ire of the god 
was expressed by sweat (steam) oozing from all parts of his body ; and 
if the people still remained obdurate, his fury became terrible : murmurs, 
bello wings, and even thunderbolts (the wooden plugs) burst from him ; 
flashes or streams of fire rushed from his mouth and head, and presently 
he was enveloped in clouds of smoke; when the people, horror stricken, 
consented to comply with the requisitions. It is very evident from the 
accounts that the priests had the means of rapidly increasing or diminish- 
ing the intensity of the fire, as the disposition of the worshippers required 
the idol to express approbation or displeasure. It further appears that the 
monks in the middle ages made use of this idol, and found it not the least 
effectual of their wonder-working machines. It was in fact in this man- 
ner chiefly that the great body of ecclesiastics then maintained their in- 
fluence over the multitude. The very same devices which their prede- 
cessors had found effectual in the temples of Osiris, Ceres, and Bacchus, 
were repeated ; and such images of the heathen gods and goddesses as 
had escaped destruction were converted into those of Christian saints, 
and being repaired were made to perform the same miracles which they 
had done before in pagan Greece and Rome. Monks, as we have before 
observed, were then the most expert mechanicians, and some of their 
most elaborate productions were imitations of ancient androidii — and 
the speaking heads of Bacon, Robert of Lincoln, Gerbert and Albertus, 
were considered proofs of an intercourse subsisting between their owners 
and spirits, as much so as in the cases of Orpheus and Odin, and other 
magicians of old. 

The name of the German idol is written differently : Puster, Pluster, 
Plusterich, Buestard, Busterich, are all names given to it and the deity it 
represents. The name is said to be derived from the Saxon verb pusten, 
to blow — or puster, a bellows : this shows its connection with the eolipile 
asa" fire blower ; and it is probable that from these eolipilic idols the 
term JEolist, " a pretender to inspiration," is derived. (See Dictionary 
Trevoux. Art. Puster.) This ancient steam idol was, A. D. 1546, placed 
for safe keeping in the fortress of Sunderhausen, where it remained dur- 
ing the last century. 

How singular that steam should have been among the motive agents 
of the most ancient idols of Egypt (as the Statue of Memnon and others) 
and in some of the deified images of Europe ! That it should formerly 
have been employed with tremendous effect to delude men, to lock them 



400 Eolipiles used in War. [Book IV. 

in ignorance ; while it now contributes so largely to enlighten and benefit 
mankind. These instances of early applications of steam make us regret 
that detailed descriptions of the various apparatus have not been preserved. 
Many ingenious devices were evidently employed, and although we con- 
demn the contrivers of such as were used for purposes of delusion, we 
cannot but admire the ingenuity which even these men displayed, in ex- 
hibiting before a barbarous people their gods in the most imposing man- 
ner and with such terrific effect — in making idols express by means of 
steam approbation and anger with the voice of thunder or the hissing 
of dragons, and causing them to appear and disappear in clouds of smoke 
and sheets of flame. 

It is probable from the antiquity of these idols and of eolipiles that 
allusions to both might be found in the Bible. May not such expressions 
as " the blast of his mouth," " the blast of the terrible ones," " the blast 
of his nostrils," &c. have reference to eolipiles or steam idols of old 1 
" Their molten images [says Isaiah] are wind and confusion." Hospita- 
bly receiving a traveler into the house during a storm, and protecting 
him from the inconvenient heat of the fire when urged by an eolipile, may 
be alluded to by the same prophet in the following passage : " Thou hast 
been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a re- 
fuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat when the blast of the terrible 
ones is as a storm against the walls." The expression ' terrible ones,' 
probably referring to the hideous forms into which we have already seen 
those blowing instruments were moulded. Eolus the god of winds was 
represented " with swoln cheeks, like one who with main force blows 
a blast, with wings on his shoulders and a fiery countenance." Idols 
were always made of a terrific form, and are so made by barbarous peo- 
ple at the present day. When God is personified as blowing on the jire y 
is there not an allusion to these instruments 1 

Eusebius, in the third book of his life of Constantine, says that when 
images were subverted, among other things found in some of them were 
" small faggots of sticks" — perhaps the remains of fuel employed to raise 
steam in them. a 

From the observation of one of the early travelers into the East, it 
seems that eolipiles were employed even in war and with great effect. 
Carpini, in the account of his travels, A. D. 1286, describes a species of 
eolipile of the human form, and apparently charged with an inflammable 
liquid, as having been used in a battle between the Mongals and the 
troops of Prester John. The latter, he says, caused a number of hollow 
figures to be made of copper, which resembled men, and being charged 
with some combustible substance, " were set upon horses, each having a 
man behind on the horse with a pair of bellows, to stir up the fire. 
When approaching to give battle, these mounted images were first sent 
forward against the enemy, and the men who rode behind set fire by some 
means to the combustibles, and blew strongly with their bellows ; and the 
Mongal men and horses were burnt with wild fire and the air was dark- 
ened with smoke. " b Supposing these eolipiles to have been charged 
with alcohol or spirit of wine, they must have been (as we see they were) 
of terrible effect, since, as modern experiments show, a jet of flame from 
each might have extended to a distance of twenty-five or thirty feet. 

Besides blowing directly upon or against a fire, eolipiles were employed 
to increase the draft of chimneys, for which purpose the jet rose perpen- 
dicularly from the centre of the dome, as in No. 181. One or two stand- 

• Peter Martyr's Common Places, Part ii, 336. b Kerr's Collection of Voyages,vol. 1, 135. 



Chap. 3.] Music produced by Eolipiles. 401 

ing on the hearth and heated by the fire, close to which they were placed, 
the vapor rushed through the orifice and drove the smoke before it ; and 
at the same time induced a current of atmospheric air to follow in the 
, same direction. Sometimes those designed for this purpose had a handle 
or bail to suspend them over the fire, as No. 183. As several ancient 
domestic customs still prevail in Italy, and numerous culinary and other 
implements found in Herculaneum and Pompeii are similar to those now 
used, it might be supposed that some relics of e'olipiles and their uses 
would be still met with in that country. The supposition has been veri- 
fied ; for we are informed that these instruments are, or were in the 
seventeenth century, " commonly made use of in Italy to cure smoaky 
chimneys, for being hung over the fire, the blast arising from them carries 
up the loitering smoke along with it" — and again, " an eolipile has been 
sometimes placed in a chimney where it can be heated, the vapor of which 
serves to drive the smoke up the chimney." This application of steam, 
it will be perceived, is similar to that lately adopted to increase the draft 
of chimneys of locomotive carriages. 

Rivius mentions another use of eolipiles. He says some were made 
of gold, silver and other costly metals, and were filled with scented 
water, " to cause a pleasant temperature, to refresh the spirit and rejoice 
the heart, not only of the healthy but also of the sick." He observes 
that they were used for these purposes in the halls and chambers of the 
wealthy. Rhenanus, an old German writer, who died in 1547; enumera- 
ting the treasures belonging to the ancient church at Mentz, mentions 
eolipiles in the form of " silver cranes, in the belly of which was put fire" 
and which gave out " a sweete savour of' perfumes by the open beake." 
Seneca has observed that perfumes were sometimes disseminated in the 
amphitheatres, by being mixed with boiling water, so that the odor rose 
and was diffused by the steam. We learn from Shakespeare that perfum- 
ing rooms was common in his time, the neglect of cleanliness rendering 
such operations necessary. It is probable that he refers to the same pro- 
cess as that mentioned by Rivius. " Being entertained for a perfumer, 
as I was smoking a room." " Much ado about Nothing" Act 1, Scene 3. 

Eolipiles were also employed to produce music. By adapting trum- 
pets, flutes, clarionets, and other wind instruments to the neck or orifice 
of one, they were sounded as by currents of air. This application of 
eolipiles is probably coeval with their invention. It is indeed only a 
variation of the supposed musical apparatus of the Memnonian Statue, 
and of the devices described by Heron. All the old writers on eolipiles 
mention it. Fludd figures a variety of instruments sounded by currents 
of steam ; and Rivius, after noticing the use of eolipiles for blowing fires 
and fumigating rooms, observes "they are also made to produce music, 
the steam passing through reeds or organ pipes, so as to cause astonish- 
ment in those who have no idea of such wonderful operations." Gerbert 
applied eolipiles in place of bellows to sound an organ at Rheims in the 
tenth century ; and the instrument according to William of Malmsbury 
was extant two hundred years afterwards. (During the middle ages, 
the churchmen were the only organ makers ; and even so late as the 
sixteenth century, they retained the manufacture chiefly in their own 
hands : in the household book of Henry VIII. mention is made of two 
payments of ten pounds each to John, or " Sir John, the organ maker," 
of whom the editor says, ' it is almost certain that he was a priest.') 

The preceding notice of eolipiles is due to them as the true germ of 
modern steam engines, for such they were, whether the latter be consider- 
ed as devices for raising water only, or as machines to move others. We 

51 



402 Applications of Steam. [Book IV. 

have seen that the oldest apparatus moved by steam, of which there is 
any account, was an eolipile suspended on its axis, at once both boiler 
and engine, (No. 180) and we shall find that the first attempts to raise 
water by the same fluid were made with the same instruments. Indeed, 
all the early experiments on steam were made with eoli piles, and all the 
first steam machines were nothing else. 



CHAPTER IV. 



Employment of steam in former times — Claims of various people to the steam engine — Application 
of steam as a motive agent, perceived by Roger Bacon — Other modern inventions and discoveries known 
to him — Spanish steam-ship in 1543 — Official documents relating to it — Remarks on these — Antiquity of 
paddle-wheels as propellers — Project of the author for propelling vessels— Experiments on steam 
in the sixteenth century — Jerome Cardan — Vacuum formed by the condensation of steam, known to the 
Alchymists — Experiments from Fludd — Others from Porta — Expansive force of steam illustrated by old 
authors — luteresting example of raising water by steam from Porta — Mathesius, Canini and Besson — 
Device for raising hot water from Decaus — Invention of the steam engine claimed by Arago for France — 
Nothing new in the apparatus of Decaus, nor in the principle of its operation — Hot springs — Geysers — 
Boilers with tubular spouts — Eolipiles — Observations on Decaus — Writings of Porta — Claims of Arago 
in behalf of Decaus untenable — Instances of hot water raised by steam in the arts — Manufacture of soap — 
Discovery of iodine — Ancient soap makers — Soap vats in Pompeii — Manipulations of ancient mechanics — 
Loss of ancient writings — Large sums anciently expended on soap — Logic of Omar. 

It will have been perceived from the preceding chapter that eolipiles 
for blowing fires and for other purposes were formerly common, and conse- 
quently that people were familiar with the generation of steam, and of 
high steam too, long before modern steam engines were known. Of the 
applications of this fluid to produce motion or raise liquids, during the 
long period that intervened between the time of Heron and the introduc- 
tion of printing into Europe, scarcely any thing is known ; yet there can 
be no doubt that it was occasionally used to a limited extent for one pur- 
pose or the other, and perhaps for both. 

As the origin and early progress of the steam engine are necessarily con 
nected with this part of our subject, the inquisitive reader will not object 
to dwell a little upon it, although some parts of the detail do not relate 
directly to the elevation of liquids. 

From the important and increasing influence of the steam engine on 
human affairs, a controversy has arisen between writers of different na- 
tions respecting the claims of their countrymen to its invention ; and some 
acrimonious feelings have been displayed. This is to be regretted as 
fostering prejudices and passions which it is the province of philosophers 
to eradicate — not to cherish. National vauntings may form articles in 
the creed, as they are made to contribute to the capital of politicians ; 
but should find no place in that of a savan. Philosophy, like Christianity, 
contemplates mankind as one family, and recognizes no sectional boast- 
ing. Neither science nor the arts are confined by degrees of longitude, 
nor are the scintillations of genius to be measured by degrees from the 
equator. As in the republic of letters, so in that of science and the arts, 



Chap. 4.] Spanish Steam Ship in 1543. 403 

geographical distinctions respecting the abode of its citizens should be 
unknown. 

A few scattered relics of ingenious men who nourished in the dark 
ages are still extant, which serve to convince us that experimental re- 
searches of some of the monks and other ardent inquirers after knowledge 
in those times were more extensive, and evinced a more thorough ac- 
quaintance with the principles of natural philosophy, than is generally 
surmised. The following remarks of Roger Bacon are an instance. From 
them w T e may safely infer that he was aware of the elastic force of steam 
and its applicability to propel vessels on water and carriages on land. 
That he was acquainted with gunpowder is generally admitted, and it 
would seem that neither diving bells nor suspension bridges escaped him: 
" Men may construct for the wants of navigation such machines that 
the greatest vessels, directed by a single man, shall cut through the rivers 
and seas with more rapidity than if they were propelled by rowers ; 
chariots may be constructed which, without horses, shall run with immea- 
surable speed. Men may conceive machines which could bear the diver, 
without danger, to the depth of the waters. Men could invent a multi- 
tude of other engines and useful instruments, such as bridges that shall 
span the broadest rivers without any intermediate support. Art has its 
thunders more terrible than those of heaven. A small quantity of matter 
produces a horrible explosion, accompanied by a bright light ; and this 
may be repeated so as to destroy a city or entire battalions." 

Bacon was not a man to speak or write in this manner at random. His 
experiments led him to the conclusions he has thus recorded, for he was 
by far the most talented and indefatigable experimental philosopher of 
his age. His discoveries however were not understood, or their impor- 
tance not appreciated, for he was imprisoned ten years as a practiser of 
magic, &c. There is a remark in his treatise " on the secret works of 
art and nature," that is too valuable to be omitted : he says a person who 
is perfectly acquainted with the manner that nature observes in her opera- 
tions, can not only rival but surpass her. " That he was acquainted with 
the rarefaction of air, and the structure of the air pump, is past contradic- 
tion." He was (says Dr. Friend) the miracle of the times he lived in, 
and the greatest genius perhaps for mechanical knowledge which ever 
appeared in the world since Archimedes. The camera obscura and 
telescope were known to him, and he has described the mode of making 
reading glasses. Most of the operations now used in chemistry are 
said to be described or mentioned by him. A description of his laborato- 
ry and of the experiments he made, with a sketch of the various appara- 
tus employed, would have been infinitely more valuable than all the 
volumes on scholastic divinity that w r ere ever written. 

In 1543, a naval officer under Charles V. is said to have propelled a 
ship of two hundred tons, by steam, in the harbor of Barcelona. No 
account of his machinery is extant, except that he had a large copper 
boiler, and that paddle wheels were suspended over the sides of the 
vessel. Like all old inventors he refused to explain the mechanism. The 
following account was furnished for publication by the superintendent of 
the Spanish royal archives. " Blasco de Garay, a captain in the navy> 
proposed in 1543, to the Emperor and King, Charles the Fifth, a machine 
to propel large boats and ships, even in calm weather, without oars or 
sails. In spite of the impediments and the opposition which this project 
met with, the Emperor ordered a trial to be made of it in the port of 
Barcelona, which in fact took place on the 17th of the month of June, 
of the said year 1543. Garay would not explain the particulars of his 



404 Spanish Steam Ship. [Book IV. 

discovery : it was evident however during the experiment that it consisted 
in a large copper of boiling water, and in moving wheels attached to 
either side of the ship. The experiment was tried on a ship of two hun- 
dred tons, called the Trinity, which came from Colibre to discharge a 
cargo of corn at Barcelona, of which Peter de Scarza was captain. By 
order of Charles V, Don Henry de Toledo the governor, Don Pedro de 
Cordova, the treasurer Ravago, and the vice chancellor, and intendant 
of Catalonia witnessed the experiment. In the reports made to the em- 
peror and to the prince, this ingenious invention was generally approved, 
particularly on account of the promptness and facility with which the 
ship was made to go about. The treasurer Ravago, an enemy to the 
project, said that the vessel could be propelled two leagues in three hours — 
that the machine was complicated and expensive — and that there would 
be an exposure to danger in case the boiler should burst. The other 
commissioners affirmed that the vessel tacked with the same rapidity as 
a galley manoeuvred in the ordinary way, and went at least a league an 
hour. As soon as the experiment was made Garay took the whole ma- 
chine with which he had furnished the vessel, leaving only the wooden 
part in the arsenal at Barcelona, and keeping all the rest for himself. In 
spite of Ravago's opposition, the invention was approved, and if the 
expedition in which Charles the Vth was then engaged had not prevented, 
he would no doubt have encouraged it. Nevertheless, the emperor pro- 
moted the inventor one grade, made him a present of two hundred 
thousand maravedis, and ordered the expense to be paid out of the trea- 
sury, and granted him besides many other favors." 

w This account is derived from the documents and original registers 
kept in the Royal Archives of Simuncas, among the commercial papers 
of Catalonia, and from those of the military and naval departments for 
the said year, 1543. Thomas Gonzalez. 

" Simuncas, August 27, 1825." 

From this account it has been inferred that steam vessels were invented 
in Spain, being only revived in modern times ; and that Blasco de Garay 
should be regarded as the inventor of the first steam engine. As long as 
the authenticity of the document is admitted and no earlier experiment 
adduced, it is difficult to perceive how such a conclusion can be avoided ; 
at least so far as stea,m vessels are concerned. It may appear singular that 
this specimen of mechanical skill should have been matured in that coun- 
try ; but at the time referred to, Spain was probably the most promising 
scene for the display of such operations. Every one knows that half a 
century before, Columbus could find a patron no where else. The great 
loss which Charles sustained in his fleet before Algiers the previous year, 
must have convinced him of the value of an invention by which ships 
could be propelled without oars or sails ; and there is nothing improbable 
in supposing the loss on that occasion (fifteen ships of war and one hun- 
dred and forty transports, in which eight thousand men perished and 
Charles himself narrowly escaped) was one principal reason for Captain 
Garay to bring forward his project. M. Arago, who advocates with pe- 
culiar eloquence and zeal the claims of Decaus and Papin, as inventors 
of the steam engine, thinks the document should be set aside for the fol- 
lowing reasons : 1st. Because it was not ]^mtei in 1543. 2d. It does 
not sufficiently prove that steam was the motive agent. 3d. If Captain 
Garay really did employ a steam engine, it was " according to all appear- 
ance" the reacting eolipile of Heron, and therefore nothing new. To 
us there does not appear much force in these reasons. M. Arago ob- 



Chap. 4.] Ohservations on Garay's Steam Apparatus. 405 

serves, " manuscript documents cannot have any value with the public, 
because, generally, it has no means whatever of verifying the date as- 
signed to them." To a limited extent this may be admitted. Respecting 
, private MSS. it may be true ; but surely official and national records like 
those referred to by the Spanish secretary should be excepted. We 
have in the eighth chapter of our Third Book quoted largely from official 
MS. documents belonging to this city, (New- York :) now these are pre- 
served in a public office and may be examined to verify our extracts as 
well as their own authenticity : and the Spanish records we presume are 
equally accessible, and their authenticity may be equally established. The 
mere printing of both could add nothing to their credibility, although it 
would afford to the public greater facilities of judging of their claims to it. 
So far from rejecting such sources of information respecting the arts of 
former times, we should have supposed they were unexceptionable. 

But it is said — although a boiler is mentioned, that is not sufficient proof 
that steam was the impelling agent, since there are various machines in 
which fire is used under a boiler, without that fluid having any thing to 
do with the operations : Well, but the account states that which really 
appears conclusive on this point, viz. that this vessel contained " boiling 
water" and thatRavago the treasurer, opposed the scheme on the ground 
that there would be an exposure to danger " in case the boiler should 
burst." As this danger could not arise from the liquid contents merely, 
but from the accumulation of steam, (the irresistible force of which was, 
as has been observed, well known from the employment of eolipiles) it is 
obvious enough that this fluid performed an essential part in the opera- 
tion — in other words was the source of the motive power. Had it not 
been necessary, Graray would never have furnished in it such a plausible 
pretext for opposition to his project. It has been also said "if we were 
to admit that the machine of Garay was set in motion by steam, it would 
not necessarily follow that the invention [steam engine] was new, and 
that it bore any resemblance to those of our day." True, but it would 
at least follow that Garay should be considered the father of steam navi- 
gatio?i, until some earlier and actual experiment is produced. Arago further 
thinks, that if Garay used steam at all, his engine was the whirling 
eolipile (No. 180) — " every thing" he observes would lead us to believe 
that he employed this. We regret to say there are strong objections to 
such an opinion. That an engine acting on the same principle of recoil 
as Heron's eolipile miglit have been made to propel a vessel of two hun- 
dred tons is admitted ; but from modern experiments with small engines 
of this description, we know; 1st, that in order to produce the reported 
result, the elasticity of the steam employed must have been equivalent to 
.a pressure of several atmospheres ; and 2d, that the enormous consump- 
tion of the fluid when used in one of these engines must have required 
either a number of boilers or one of extraordinary dimensions. Had 
Garay employed several boilers, the principal difficulty would be removed, 
as he might then have made them sufficiently strong to resist the pressure 
of the confined vapor ; he however used but one, and every person who 
has witnessed the operation of reacting engines will admit that a single 
boiler could hardly have been made to furnish the quantity of steam re- 
quired, at ike requisite degree of tension. 

As the nature of this Spanish engine is not mentioned, every person is 
left to form his own opinion of it. We see no difficulty in admitting that 
he employed the elastic force of steam to push a piston to and fro — or 
that he formed a vacuum under one by condensing the vapor. Such ap- 
plications of steam were as likely to occur to a person deeply engaged in 



406 Substitute for Paddle Wheels. [Book IV 

devising modes of employing it, in the sixteenth as well as in the seven- 
teenth century, notwithstanding the objection so often reiterated, that 
the arts were not sufficiently matured for the fabrication of a metallic 
cylinder and piston, and apparatus for transmitting the movements of a 
piston to revolving mechanism. The casting and boring of pieces of 
ordnance show that the construction of a steam cylinder was not beyond 
the arts of the sixteenth century, or even of the two preceding ones; while 
the water-works, consisting of forcing pumps worked by wheels, and 
also numerous other machines put in motion by cranks, (and the irre- 
gularity of their movements being also regulated by fly wheels) described 
in the works of Besson, A^ricola, &c. show that engineers at that time 
well understood the means of converting rotary into rectilinear motions, 
and rectilinear into rotary ones. 

Had Garay used a steam apparatus on the principle of Savery's, 
Papin's, or Leopold's, to raise water upon an overshot wheel fixed on the 
same axle as the paddles, we should probably have heard of it, since such 
a wheel would have been a more prominent object than the paddles or 
the boiler itself. 

It need not excite surprise that Garay adopted paddle wheels as pro- 
pellers, since they were well known before his time, being of very an- 
cient date. Roman galleys were occasionally moved by them, and they 
have probably never been wholly laid aside in Europe since the fall of 
the empire. Stuart, in his Anecdotes of the Steam Engine, observes that 
the substitution of them for oars is mentioned in several old military trea- 
tises. In some ancient MSS. in the King of France's library it is said 
that boats, in which a Roman army under Claudius Candex were trans- 
ported into Sicily, were propelled by wheels moved by oxen. An an- 
cient bas-relief has also been found representing a galley with three wheels 
on each side ; the whole being moved by three pair of oxen. Robertus 
Valturius, in his De Re Militari, Verona, 1472, gives a figure of a galley 
with^ye paddle wheels on each side. Another is portrayed with one on 
each side. To these we add another from the Nuremburg Chronicle, 
published in 1497 ; at folio XCVIII a vessel is figured with two wheels 
on the side that is represented. An old English writer mentions them 
in 1573 ; and in 1682, a horse tow-boat with paddle wheels was used at 
Chatham, England. 

Of various substitutes for revolving oars or paddle wheels, there is one 
which, among other things, we have long purposed to try. It consists in 
protruding into the water, in a horizontal direction from close receptacles 
formed in the stern and below the water line, a series of two or more 
solid, or tight hollow bodies, of such dimensions that the water displaced 
might afford a resistance sufficient to drive forward the boat. Some idea 
of this resistance may be obtained by attempting to sink an empty barrel 
or hogshead, or by pushing a bucket or washing tub into a liquid, bottom 
downwards. The moveable bodies or propellers might be square boxes 
of wood, closed tight and made to slide in and out at the stern like the 
drawers of a bureau ; their outer ends being flush with the stern when 
drawn in, and the joint (at the stern) made tight by some contrivance 
analogous to a stuffing box ; their velocity and length of stroke being 
proportioned to the size of the vessel and its required speed. The wa- 
ter itself would drive or help to drive back each propeller at the termi- 
nation of its stroke, just as a hollow vessel is pushed up when thrust un- 
der water. The receptacles might be open at the top so as to allow any 
water which leaked in at the joint to be readily discharged. We are 
not aware that such a plan has ever been proposed. 



Chap. 4.] Raising Water by the condensation of Steam. 401 

There are several indications that mechanicians in different parts of 
Europe, were alive to the power developed by steam at the time Garay 
was making his experiments ; and we have little doubt that interesting 
information respecting it will yet be obtained from the obsolete tomes of 
the XV and XVI centuries. Those old authors, whose works are gener- 
ally quoted on the subject, obviously derived their information principally 
from those of their predecessors as well as from the laboratories of the 
alchymists. 

Jerome Cardan, an Italian, born in 1501 and died in 1575, one of the 
most eccentric geniuses that ever lived, in whom was united " the most 
transcendent attainments with the most consummate quackery, profound 
sagacity with the weakest superstition ; who on one page is seen draw T - 
ing the horoscope of Christ, and in another imploring his forgiveness 
for the sin of having eaten a partridge on Friday ; unfolding the most 
beautiful relations in algebraic analysis, and foretelling from the ap- 
pearance of specks on his nails his approach to some discovery ; above 
all, eloquently enforcing the obligations of a pure religion and expressing 
the finest sentiments in morals, while his long life was one continued ex- 
ertion, grossly outraging both. Here, this philosopher, juggler and 
madman, is entitled to brief mention from displaying in his writings a 
knowledge of what has been called the capabilities of steam, and more 
particularly with the fact of a vacuum being speedily procured by its 
condensation." 

That the alchymists were familiar with 
the formation of a vacuum by the con- 
densation of steam, and with raising water 
into it by atmospheric pressure is certain. 
Their ordinary manijiulations necessarily 
made them acquainted with both. In 
Fludd's Integrum Morborum Mysterium, 
page 462, he illustrates his notions re- 
specting fever and dropsy, by what he 
calls a common experiment, and with the 
apparatus figured in the cut. An empty 
retort or one containing a little water was 

suspended over a fire with the neck turned 
No. 186. Fludd. down intQ a vesgel of water . when the 

retort was heated the air or vapor became expanded and part of -it driven 
out through the liquid. Upon removing the fire, the water was forced by 
the atmosphere through the neck to supply the place of the air or vapor 
expelled by the heat. This although nothing more than the old process 
of filling eolipiles, most of which could be charged in no other way, 
shows that the principle was well understood and adopted in various 
operations. We add another and earlier example from Porta's Natural 
Magic, a work first published in 1560, where he distinctly shows the 
formation c-f a vacuum by the condensation of steam, and raising of water 
into it by the atmosphere. " Make a vessel with a very long neck ; the 
longer it is, the greater wonder it will seem to be. Let it be of transpa- 
rent glass that you may see the water running up : fill this with boiling 
water, and when it is very hot, or setting the bottom of it to the fire that 
it may not presentlie wax cold ; the mouth being turned downwards that 
it may touch the water, it will suck it all in." Discharging the hot water 
is not mentioned, but that is of course implied, and before the vessel was 
placed on the fire — while full of hot water, it could not suck up any of 
the cold. (Book 19, cap. 3.) 




408 Raising Water by the Elasticity of Steam, from Porta. [Book I V 



That the same laborious experimenters were acquainted with the proper- 
ty of steam to displace liquids from close vessels is equally clear. Many 
of their operations made them familiar with the fact that in this respect its 
effects were similar to those of compressed air. Portions of their appa- 
ratus were admirably adapted to produce jets of water by means of 
steam — the mere opening of a cock to draw off the liquid contents of a 
heated alembic would often illustrate the operation, just as the overturn- 
ing of an eolipile, or inclining one till the orifice was covered with water, 
would do. 

So far as relates to the principles of raising liquids into a vacuum formed 
by the condensation of steam, and forcibly ejecting them by its elasticity, 
nothing new was discovered by Decaus, Worcester, Savery, or Papin : 
both operations had long been performed with eolipiles, and were of com- 
mon occurrence in laboratories. It was in the extension of these opera- 
tions to hydraulic purposes that the merits of those last named consisted. 
' Draining machines' were wholly out of the track of the transmuters of 
metals — the design of such contrivances was one which few if any of 
them would have stooped to pursue. Had they made the raising of 
water by steam a subject of particular study, hardly one of them could 
have failed to produce a machine similar to Savery's, for every element 
of it was in their possession and in constant use. 'Tis true we have 
as yet referred only to the expulsion of hot water from close vessels, 
but the application of steam to drive cold liquids 
from a separate vessel was not unknown. Of this 
there is an incidental but very conclusive proof in 
a book of Porta's, entitled Spiritali, (named after 
Heron's work) originally published in Latin in 
1601, and five years after in Italian and Spanish. 
In the translation of 1606, is the annexed figure 
No. 187, designed to show " into how many parts 
a simple portion of water may be transformed" 
i. e. by measuring the quantity expelled from a 
close vessel, by vapor evolved from a certain quan- 
tity heated in a retort. " Make a box of glass or 
tin, (c) the bottom of which should be pierced with 
a hole, through which shall pass the neck of a bot- 
tle (a) used for distilling, containing one or two 
ounces of water. The neck shall be soldered to the bottom of the box 
so .that nothing can escape there. From the same bottom shall proceed 
a pipe, (i) the opening of which shall almost touch it, leaving just room 
enough between them for the water to run. This pipe shall pass through 
an opening in the lid of the box, and extend itself on the outside to a 
small distance from its surface. The box must be filled with water by a 
funnel (e) which is afterwards to be well closed, so as not to allow the 
air [steam] to escape : — finally, the bottle must be placed upon the fire 
and heated a little ; then the water, changed into steam, will act violently 
upon the water in the box, and will make it pass through the pipe (i) and 
flow off on the outside," &c. a This apparatus although designed merely 
to illustrate the relative bulk of a volume of water and that of the steam 
into which it might be converted, yet exhibits in the clearest light the 
principle afterwards adopted for raising liquids by the elasticity of steam. 




No. 187. A. D. 1606. Porta. 



a Arago's History of the Steam Engine, translated by Lieut. Harewood, U. S. N., 
Journal of the Franklin Institute, Vol. XXV. This device of Porta's was, we believe, 
first brought forward by Mr. Ainger, an English writer, whose work we have not seen. 

52 



Chap. 4.] Rupture of Vessels by Steam. 409 

The diagram and description, observes Stuart, are so complete, that the 
application to such a purpose of a similar apparatus could not be consi- 
dered even as a variation of Porta's idea. 

In the first histories of the modern steam engine, its origin was traced 
'to a device for raising water, proposed by the Marquis of Worcester, in 
his Century of Inventions, a tract written in 1655 and published in 1663. 
Subsequent researches have brought to light facts (some of which have 
just been noticed) which prove that steam was applied to that and other 
purposes long before ; and future inquiries will probably produce still 
earlier examples. Previous to describing other old applications of this 
fluid, we shall notice some experiments which historians of the steam en- 
gine have introduced. Thus Rivault, a French courtier, is said to have 
" discovered" in 1605 that a tight bomb shell containing water and thrown 
into a fire would be exploded by the confined vapor — and by Decaus in 
1615, that a close copper ball partly filled with water and heated, would 
be rent asunder with a noise resembling that of a petard — and by the 
Marquis of Worcester in 1663, that a piece of ordnance would also be 
exploded, if treated in the same way with its mouth and touch-hole plug- 
ged up. Now, the fact which these experiments established (if they 
were all made) was one with which every person who ever used an 
eolipile was familiar ; and which was no more a new discovery in the 
beginning of the seventeenth century, than experiments to prove that the 
cover of a common cauldron might be blown off by the same agent, could 
have been in the middle of it. It was a knowledge of the same fact that 
led ancient philosophers to account for the phenomenon of earthquakes — - 
which induced the ministers of the steam deities, mentioned in the last 
chapter, to regulate the resistance of the plugs which closed the mouth 
and eyes of the idols, so as to give way before the tension of the steam 
exceeded the strength of the metal, and blew both them and their gods to 
atoms. When the Spanish treasurer objected to the project of Garay that 
the boiler might " burst," he did not dream of having made a discovery of 
the danger arising from imprisoned steam : had such been the case his ob- 
jection would have had no force till the fact upon which it was based, had 
been tested and become generally known — but the ground of his opposition 
every person of that age could appreciate as well as we can ; and it is not 
improbable that on that ground only was the project abandoned. The 
same objection still prevents thousands from traveling either in steam boats 
or steam carriages. 

Examples to show that old chemists were as familiar with the same fact 
almost as with " the cracklings of thorns under a pot," might be quoted in 
abundance — they are not necessary, but we shall adduce one or two. In 
Porta's Natural Magic, (Book X, chap. 1, on Distillation,) he speaks of re- 
gulating the capacity of stills to the various substances treated in them. 
Such as were of " a flat and vapourous nature" require, he observes, large 
vessels, " for when ijie heat shall have raised up the flatulent matter, and it 
finds itself straighten'd .... it will seek some other vent, and so tear the 
vessels in pieces, which will fly about with a great bounce and crack, and not 
without endamaging the standers by." Again, in the ninth chapter of the 
same book, he directs that particular care should be taken to make the joints 
tight " lest the force of the vapours arising may burst it [the still] open 
and scald the faces of the by standers." That such occurrences were not 
uncommon may be inferred from another remark ; (in the 21st chapter of the 
10th book,) speaking of" the separation of the elements" and of the various 
substances distilled, he observes, " we account those airy which fill the ves- 
sels and receivers and easily burst them, and so flie out." These examples 



410 



Raising Hot Water by Steam, from Decaus. [Book IV 



are sufficient to prove that the irresistible force of steam when confined, was 
known in the middle of the sixteenth century — in fact it always has been 
known since distillation was practised or an eolipile used. Particular 
care was always required to keep the orifice of the latter instrument open 
when on the fire. 

Besides the Natural Magic of Porta and the writings of Cardan, there 
were other works published in the sixteenth century in which steam is 
either incidentally mentioned, or expressly treated on. About the year 
1560, Mathesius, a German preacher, in order to illustrate the enormous 
force of a little imprisoned vapor, introduced into a sermon a description 
of an apparatus " answering to a steam engine" — an instance of ingenuity 
equal to that of Cardan, who contrived to swell the contents of a treatise 
on arithmetic, (which he wrote for the booksellers by the page) by ex- 
patiating on the motions of the planets, on the creation, and the tower of 
Babel. Canini, a Venetian, made experiments on steam in 1566. In 
1569, an anonymous tract, printed at Orleans, and ascribed to Besson, 
contains an account of the expansion of water into steam, and the relative 
volumes of each. About 1597, a German writer proposed the whirling 
eolipile of Heron, as a substitute for dogs in turning the spit, and recom- 
mended it in a passage, an extract from which may be seen at page 76 of 
this volume. 

The " Forcible Movements" of Decaus, or de Caus, is the next au- 
thority for early notices of steam. This work was first published at 
Frankfort in 1615, and in Paris in 1624. It is entitled Lies Raisons des 
Forces Mouv antes, avec diverses machines tant utiles que plaisantes, &c : — 
Reasons of moving forces, with various machines both useful and inter- 
esting. The title seems to have been slightly changed in different editions; 
and, as noticed at page 319, the name of the author also; a circumstance 

that has led Mr. Farey to suppose there 
were two books, written by different au- 
thors of the same name. In the English 
translation of 1659, which consists of two 
parts : " The theorie of the conduct of wa- 
ter" and the " Forcible movements," the 
theorems on steam are omitted. By these 
theorems Decaus intended to show that 
heat carries off water by evaporation — that 
steam when condensed returns to its origin- 
al bulk — and that a hollow ball or eolipile 
may be exploded by it. The only device 
for employing this fluid which he has given, 
is in illustration of the fifth theorem, viz : 
Water maybe raised above its level by means 
of fire : " The third method of raising water 
is by the aid of fire, whereby diverse ma- 
chines may be made. I shall here give 
the description of one. Take a ball of 
copper marked A, well soldered at every 
part. It must have a vent hole marked jD 
by which water may be introduced ; and 
also a tube marked C, soldered into the 
top of the ball, and the end C reaching 
nearly to the bottom, but not touching it. 
After filling this ball with water through the vent hole, stop it close and 




No. 183. Decaus, A. D. 1615. 



Chap. 4.] Vessels with Tubular Spouts. 411 

put the ball on the fire, then the heat acting against the said ball, will causa 
all the water to rise through the tube C" 

On the supposition that this apparatus was originally designed by T)e- 
caus, M. Arago has claimed for France the invention of the steam engine. 
The English, he observes in his Memoir of Watt, have ascribed the honor 
to the Marquis of Worcester ; but on this side the channel, "we main- 
tain that it belongs to a humble engineer, almost forgotten by our bio- 
graphers, viz. Solomon de Caus." And in his 'History of the Steam 
Engine,' he asserts that "the idea of raising water by the elastic force 
of steam" belongs to the same individual. With the disposition and 
even an anxiety to give to every inventor his full meed of praise, we 
confess that we cannot perceive in the figure and description before us, 
sufficient ground from which such inferences could fairly be drawn. 
The fact is, to no one age or people can the origin of the steam engine 
be attributed — nor yet its various applications. That some have contri- 
buted greatly more than others to develope, mature and apply it, no 
person doubts. 

Were it even admitted that no apparatus precisely like that represented 
in the figure was previously known, it would be difficult to establish the 
claims put forward in behalf of Decaus. But there was nothing novel 
either in its construction or in the principle of its operation ; while for 
nearly all practical purposes it was valueless. 

So far as respects the apparatus simply, no part of it was invented by 
him. It is figured in the Spiritalia as an illustration of Problem IX, viz. 
a hollow sphere partly filled with water, and resting upon a tripod, with 
a jet pipe extending down into the liquid. Instead of fire under it to 
raise steam, a syringe is connected to the upper part, by which to inject 
air or water. This figure is copied in Plate VII of the *' Forcible Move- 
ments," (Leak's Trans.) and of it Decaus observes, " as concerning the 
figure of the globe, it may serve for pleasure to cast the water very high 
by the pipe, after that you have forced it in with violence with the sy- 
ringe." Had not this device of raising water by air compressed with a 
syringe been found in the Spiritalia, it might also have been deemed the 
invention of Decaus, for he does not mention the source whence he de- 
rived it; and as it is, we think he may with as much reason be considered 
the author of <zzV-engines, as the first inventor of steam engines. The 
apparatus is also a modification of that by which Heron raised water by 
the heat of the sun, but the author of the Spiritalia was too well versed 
in the subject, to introduce in that work such a device as that of Decaus. 

The elevation of water by the elastic force of steam was also well 
known before the time of Decaus. Nature herself has always presented 
striking proofs of it in boiling springs, and in the magnificent fountains 
and jets that are thrown up in various parts of the earth from subter- 
raneous cauldrons by imprisoned steam ; as in the Geysers of Iceland, 
where the hot liquid is thus violently forced through natural tubes, of 
nine or ten feet in diameter, to heights varying from twenty to ninety 
feet, and accompanied with intermitting volumes of the vapor ; pheno- 
mena the philosophy of which was well understood by the ancients. But 
if such examples are deemed too indirect, and as known only to a few, 
there are others with which people generally have always been conver- 
sant : Vessels for heating water, with tubular spouts, whose upper orifices 
stand higher than the top of the vessels or the liquid within them, are of 
extreme antiquity; some that resemble our tea-kettles and coffee-pots are 
found portrayed on the paintings and sculptures of Egypt. Now every 



412 Observations on the device of Decaus. [Book IV 

one knows that when the covers of these fit so close as to prevent the 
steam from escaping as fast as it is generated, the confined vapor forces up 
the hot liquid through the spouts ; and in a manner precisely the same as 
described by Decaus, for the effect is the same whether the discharging 
tube be connected to the lower side of a boiler like a tea-kettle spout, or 
inserted through the top and continued within to the liquid. From such 
domestic exhibitions of the effects of steam, the devices of Heron and 
other ancient experimenters were probably derived : a person whose 
thoughts were turned to the subject of raising water by it could not fail to 
profit by them, or to hit upon so slight a modification of the apparatus as 
shown in the last figure. 

The same application of steam was often exhibited by alchymists as al- 
ready observed in their manipulations, and in drawing off the contents of 
their stills and retorts ; but it was still more clearly illustrated in common 
life in the employment of eolipiles, and the copper ball of Decaus was 
merely one of these with ajetpipe prolonged into the liquid. The very terms 
" ball of copper," " ball of brass," were those by which eolipiles were 
designated. (See page 396.) Now no one was ignorant that an opening 
on the top of one of these instruments let out steam, and that through one 
near the bottom hot water would be violently expelled through a vertical 
tube, if attached to the opening. Suppose the one figured at No. 1S5 
either accidentally or designedly placed on the fire with the tube inclined 
upwards, and heated in that position while two thirds filled with water ; 
the vapor would then accumulate in the dome, and would necessarily 
drive out the boiling liquid until the lower orifice of the tube was no longer 
covered with water : or imagine No. 184 inclined till water rushed out 
instead of steam. That such experiments were not only frequent but com- 
mon, no person can reasonably doubt, although no notice of them may be 
found in books. Such a mode of raising water was of little value and not 
thought worth recording, and but for its introduction into some histories 
of the steam-engine, we should not have deemed it of sufficient importance 
to notice. Moreover, the ordinary mode of charging eolipiles which had 
but one minute orifice, viz. by heating and then plunging them in water, 
must have frequently caused them to produce liquid jets, in consequence 
of their imbibing too much, and there being no other way of expelling 
the surplus than by placing the instrument on the fire. Probably an eoli- 
pile was never used that was not occasionally overcharged with the liquid, 
and thus made to raise a portion of it by the elastic force of steam. At 
any rate, no one who was familiar with these instruments, from Heron to 
Decaus, could have been ignorant of the fact that they might be applied to 
produce jets of hot water as well as of vapor ; and few ever used them 
who did not occasionally make them produce both. 

It would be an unjust reflection on Decaus to suppose he could not have 
given a better plan than No. 18S for raising water by steam, if the project 
had been seriously entertained by him ; but there is not the slightest ground 
to believe he ever dreamt of applying that fluid to hydraulic purposes, or 
as a substitute for pumps, chains of pots, &c. He certainly would have 
laughed at any one proposing a device by which water could not be raised 
until the whole of it was boiled, whether the quantity was a pint, a hogs- 
head, or a million of gallons ; and in some cases not until its temperature 
far exceeded that at which ebullition in open vessels takes place. Why 
then, it may be asked, did he mention the device at all] Simply to show 
that " waterway be raised above its level by means of fire." Well, but 
he says that "diverse machines" may be deduced from it. True, and he 
has given a description of one, from which we may judge of the rest : these 



Chap. 4.] Observations on the device of Decerns. 413 

were most likely mere trifles — whims that suited the taste of the age. 
No. 189 is probably one of them, which a contemporaneous English author 
adduces under " Experiments of mocions by rarefying water with fier," 
and of which he also observes, other devices may be derived from it. 

Decaus appears to have read and traveled much, and to have collected 
knowledge from every source within his reach. He describes saw-mills 
that were used in Switzerland, fire-engines of Germany, canal-locks which 
he noticed between Venice and Padua : he cites Tacitus, Pausanias and 
Pliny; quotes largely from Heron, and refers his more learned readers to 
Archimedes, a commentary upon whose writings he promises to undertake. 
Of course he was acquainted with the works of Porta, for this Neapolitan 
philosopher and his writings were greatly celebrated throughout Eu- 
rope. Now had Decaus turned his thoughts at all to the elevation of water 
by steam, he would at once have perceived the advantages of a device 
like No. 137, by which the liquid could be raised in unlimited quantities 
without being heated at all, as well as under all possible circumstances : 
and having perceived this, would he not (if the project of thus raising 
water had ever entered his head) have given it, or a modification of it, 
instead of No. 18S ] It is clear that he wanted an illustration of a propo- 
sition merely, and the one he has given he considered as good as any 
other. 

As long as the Natural Magic and the Spiritali of Porta are admitted 
to have been published, the former about fifty and the latter at least ten 
years before the work of Decaus, there is little if any thing whereon to 
found a claim for the latter. If we were to concede, what certainly is not 
" established beyond dispute, that the first idea of raising a weight by means 
of the elastic power of steam belongs to the French author," the fact would 
still remain that the Neapolitan had long before shown how this could be 
done ; and M. Arago has himself observed, that " in the arts, as in the 
sciences, the last comer is supposed to be acquainted with the labors of 
those who preceded him — all denial in this respect is without value." The 
object of Porta in introducing the device referred to was not to show its 
application to raise water, and it is not fair to conclude that he was igno- 
rant of its adaptation for that purpose because he has not gone out of his 
way to point it out. It has also been objected, that his apparatus raised 
the liquid to a very limited height. We do not know that Decaus's did 
more, for we are only told that the contents of the ball would be driven 
out, without the slightest intimation of an elevated discharge. Well, (an 
advocate of the latter will say) but his apparatus is capable of raising wa- 
ter to all heights. And so is Porta's. But had Porta " the least idea of 
the great power which steam is susceptible of acquiring'?" The extracts 
which we have given from his Natural Magic, on the rupture of vessels 
by steam, prove that he was well aware of it ; and the book from which 
these extracts are taken was his earliest production, being published in 
1560, at which time (he observes in the preface) he was only about fifteen 
years old. To conclude, we are constrained to embrace the opinion, not- 
withstanding the arguments and eloquence of M. Arago, that the device 
described by Decaus brought to light no new fact, and gave rise to no new 
or useful result. 

Although instances rarely occur in the arts in which the elevation of 
hot water by the steam evolved from it could be of service, there are some, 
as in chemical manipulations, in .a few breweries and distilleries, and also 
in soap manufactories. The operation in the latter is worth noticing : — 
In the ordinary process of manufacturing common hard soap, three or four 
tons are often made at once in a deep iron vat or boiler. Into this several 



414 Hot water raised by Steam in soap manufactories. [Book IV. 

hundred gallons of ley, with the other ingredients, tallow, rosin, lime, &c. 
are put. After the whole has been several times boiled, the semi-fluid 
mass is suffered to remain some time at rest, when the ley collecting at the 
bottom leaves a thick stratum of soap formed above. As no openings are 
made in the sides or bottom of the boiler, the hot ley is drawn off at the 
top, and is usually done by a common pump. Long after the fire is with- 
drawn steam continues to rise from the liquid below ; for, from the vast 
mass of heated materials, their non-conducting property, and that of the 
furnace, the heat is slowly dissipated. The soap in the mean time acquires 
a firmer consistence, and prevents the vapor from escaping above almost as 
effectually as the bottom of the boiler does below ; so that not until the 
steam attains considerable elastic force can it open a passage through, 
and when it does the opening is instantly closed as before. When there- 
fore the pump is pushed through the whole to the bottom of the vat, and 
started to work, the liquid continues of itself to pass up, being urged by 
the steam. (It is necessary to work the pump at first because the open- 
ings in its end become stopped with soap in passing it down. The end 
of a plain tube would be choked in the same way ; but by a pump at- 
tached to it, the pressure of the atmosphere is added to that of the steam 
to force the passage open.) The large body of soap keeps settling down 
as the ley is discharged, and thus preserves the steam at the same degree 
of tension until all the ley is ejected, when the steam itself escapes also 
through the pump. The soap, it will be perceived, acts as a flexible pis- 
ton, its adhesion to the sides of the boiler and its spissitude and weight 
effectually confining the vapor below. 

Of the origin of this mode of raising ley, and the extent to which it is 
practiced, we are not informed. It affords however an example of the 
truth of the remark, that important results may be deduced from attention 
to simple facts, as well as from the observance of common products. An 
examination of the residuum of a soap-boiler's kettle, it is well known, led 
to the discovery of a new chemical element, (iodine,) and of its virtues as 
a specific in the cure of the goitre ; and from the preceding remarks it may 
be inferred, that an observing Greek or Roman soap-boiler might have 
discovered the applicability of steam to raise water, since he possessed all 
the requisite machinery in his ordinary apparatus, and might have per- 
formed the operation as often as he made soap. His ingenuity would also 
have been rewarded by a diminution of his labor. And who can prove 
that such a plan was not in use in some of the old soap-factories of former 
times 1 In that, for example, which has been discovered in Pompeii, in 
one apartment of which are the vats, placed on a level with the ground, 
and in another were found heaps of lime of so superior a quality as to 
have excited the admiration of modern manufacturers. 4 * 

Of the manipulations of ancient mechanics and manufacturers we know 
little or nothing. Of the thousands of their devices, many valuable ones 
have certainly been lost. Some of these have been revived or rediscovered 
in modern times, among which we think may be mentioned various appli- 
cations of steam. There were indeed so many occasions for the employ- 
ment of this fluid by the ancients, and particularly in raising of water, that, 
taken in connection with the information respecting it in the Spiritalia, the 
part it was made to perform in the temples, the traces of it in the hot 

a Soap must have been an expensive article among the Greeks, at least such as was 
used in the toilette, if we were to judge from the amount that Demetrius extorted from 
the Athenians, viz. 250 talents, which, says Plutarch, "he gave to Lamia and his other 
mistresses to buy soap." 



Chap. 4. J Ancient Writings on the Arts destroyed. 415 

baths at Rome, and the apparatus of Anthemius, by which last it was 
adapted to a very novel purpose as a motive agent, thus exhibiting re- 
sources in its appplication that could only be derived from experience — 
we cannot divest ourselves of the idea that the ancients were better ac- 
quainted with the mechanical properties of steam and its application to the 
arts than is commonly supposed. 

But for the destruction of the numerous libraries of the ancients, some 
of which contained volumes that treated on every subject, we should have 
been intimately acquainted with their arts and machinery ; and but for 
the logic of Omar, a we might have been in possession of those treatises 
on mechanics that Ctesibius studied, and which supplied Heron with ma- 
terials for the Spiritalia ; for the latter refers to inventions and writings of 
his predecessors, and admits having incorporated some of their produc- 
tions with his own. Possibly the very books out of which he selected the 
applications of steam No. 179 and No. 180 might now have been extant. 
The destruction of such works as these was a severe loss to the world. 
Had they been saved, the state of society would not, in the following 
ages, have been so greatly degenerated, nor would the arts have sunk to 
so low an ebb. Mechanics have therefore as much reason, if not more, to 
deplore the loss of those volumes that treated on the subjects of their pur- 
suits, as learned men have to regret the destruction of those that related 
to literature only. It was also easier to replace the latter than the former 
— to revive the literature than the arts of the ancients ; for reflections on 
history, politics, morals, literature, romance, &c. are more or less common 
to our race in all times, and in every age men will be found to clothe 
them, or selections of them, in glowing language ; whereas mechanical 
inventions, though often brought about by the observance of common 
facts, are frequently the results of fortuitous thoughts which local occur- 
rences or singular circumstances induce, and if once lost can hardly b^ 
revived, except by congenial minds under similar circumstances. Besides, 
it is not by the mere arresting an idea as it floats through the mind that 
discoveries or improvements in mechanism are effected : on the contrary, 
it requires to be cultivated and matured by reflection ; the accuracy of the 
device suggested by it has to be tested by models, and these by experi- 
ment, before the incipient thought becomes embodied in a working ma- 
chine. 

a Amrou, his general, having taken Alexandria, wrote for directions respecting the 
disposition of the famous library which it had been the pride of the Ptolemies to collect. 
The reply was — if the writings agreed with the doctrines of the Koran, they were use- 
less; and if they did not, they ought to be destroyed. The argument was irresistible, 
and the whole were burnt. 



416 Few Inventions formerly recorded. [Book IV. 



CHAPTER V. 



Few Inventions formerly recorded — Lord Bacon — His project for draining mines — Thomas Bushell — 
Ice produced by hydraulic machines — Eolipiles — Branca's application of the blast of one to produce 
motion — Its inutility — Curious extract from Wilkius — Ramseye's patent for raising water by fire — Ma- 
nufacture of nitre — Figure illustrating the application of steam, from an old English work — Kircher's 
device for raising water by steam — John Bate — Antiquity of boys' kites in England — Discovery of at- 
mospheric pressure — Engine of motion — Anecdotes of Oliver Evans and John Fitch — Elasticity and 
condensation of steam — Steam-engines modifications of guns — A moving piston the essential feature in 
both — Classification of modern steam engines — Guerricke's apparatus — The same adopted in steam-en- 
gines — Guerricke one of the authors of the steam-engine. 

How few, how exceedingly few of the conceptions and experimental 
researches of mechanics have ever been recorded ! How many millions 
of men of genius have passed through life without making their discove- 
ries known ! Even since printing was introduced, not a moiety of those 
who possessed in an unusual degree the faculty of invention have pre- 
served any of their ideas on paper. Of some men celebrated for the no- 
velty of their devices, nothing is known but their names ; they have gone, 
and not a trace of their labors is left. Of others, the title by which they 
designated their inventions is nearly all that has come down — no particu- 
lars by which we might judge of their merits. This is the case with many 
of the old experimenters on steam, especially those who raised or at- 
tempted to raise water by it. Among these we have sometimes thought 
Lord Bacon should have a place, under the impression that he employed, 
or designed to employ, that fluid to raise water from the deluged mines 
which he undertook to recover. He obviously had some new modes and 
machines for the purpose. An account of these he laid before the King, 
(James I) who approved of the project, and consented that the aid of 
parliament should be invoked. In the " Speech touching the recovery of 
drown'd mineral works," which Bacon prepared to be delivered before 
parliament, is the following passage : "And I may assure your Lordships 
that all my proposals, in order to this great architype, seemed so rational and 
feasable to my Royal Sovereign, our Christian Salomon, [!] that I thereby 
prevailed with his Majesty to call this honorable Parliament, to confirm 
and impower me, in my own way of mining, by an act of the same." 8 This 
great man was therefore in possession of a novel plan of accomplishing 
one of the most arduous undertakings in practical hydraulics; and so im- 
pressed with a belief in its efficiency that the king was induced by him to 
call, or agree to call, a parliament, chiefly it would seem to give sanction 
to it. What the plan was, we are not informed, nor is any account of it 
believed to be extant. Dr. Tenison, (Archbishop of Canterbury) the au- 
thor of " Baconiana," alluding in 1G79 to Bacon's " Mechanical Inventions," 
observes, " His instruments and ways in recovering deserted mines, I can 
give no account of at all ; though certainly, without new tools, and peculiar 
inventions, he would never have undertaken that new and hazardous 
work." b That the project consisted chiefly in some peculiar mode of 
raising the water is certain ; and it is worthy of remark that a member of 

a Baconiana. Lond. 1679, p. 133. b "An Account of all the Lord Bacon's Works," 
Subjoined to Baconiana, p. 17. 



Chap. 5.] Lord Bacon's Project for raising Water from Mines. 417 

his household was a mining engineer, and celebrated for the invention or 
construction of hydraulic engines, viz. " Mr. Thomas Bushell, one of his 
lordship's menial servants ; a man skilful in discovering and opening of 
mines, and famous for his curious water-works in Oxfordshire, by which 
he imitated rain, hail, the rainbow, thunder and lightning."* This was 
probably the same individual who is mentioned in some biographies as 
" Master of the Royal Mines in Wales," under Charles I. 

That the application of steam to drain mines and impart motion to ma- 
chinery had begun to excite attention in England before the death of Ba 
con, (in 1626) is very obvious. Of this there are several indications ; 
and within four years of his demise, & patent was granted for a method of 
discharging water " from low pitts by fre." Then he was acquainted 
with the writings of Porta, and consequently with the apparatus No. 187. 
No experiment or fact of the kind illustrated by this could have escaped 
him, even if he had not been engaged in the project of recovering flooded 
mines ; and he was, to say the least, as likely as any other man of his age 
to perceive the adaptation of such an apparatus as No. 187 for raising wa- 
ter, and also to apply it. We hear of no such uses of steam in England 
before his time, but soon after his death they make their appearance with- 
out any one very distinctly to claim them. It may however be said, if 
Bacon raised water by steam, Bushell, his engineer, would most likely 
have done the same after the death of the chancellor, and proofs of this 
fact might be obtained from an examination of the water-works of the 
latter. Had we any account of these, the question most likely could be 
settled ; but almost the only information we have respecting the machines 
and labors of Bushell is contained in the extract above, and there is but 
one particular from which any thing respecting their construction can be 
inferred, viz. — hail is said to have been produced by them. How this 
was done we know not ; possibly by admitting high steam into a close 
vessel, from which water mixed with air b was expelled with a velocity 
sufficient to produce ice, somewhat in the same manner as the operation is 
performed by compressed air in the pressure engine described at page 362. 
The same thing was done by others who we know did experiment on 
steam, and who performed the operation without the aid of a great fall of 
water. The Marquis of Worcester makes it the subject of the 18th pro- 
position of his " Century of Inventions," in a fountain which he says a 
child could invert. And a century before, Cornelius Drebble " made 
certain machines which produced rain, hail and lightning, as naturally as 
if these effects proceeded from the sky." 

But whether Lord Bacon used steam or not — and it must be admitted 
that there is no direct evidence that he did — it is interesting to know that 
his great mind was bent to the subject of raising water on the most ex- 
tensive scale, and this too at the time when steam first began to be propo- 
sed for that purpose in England. On this account, if on no other, are his 
labors entitled to notice here. c 

a Account of Lord Bacon's Works, p. 19. 

b Dr. (afterwards Bishop) Burnett, in his Letters from Italy, noticing the water-works 
atFrescati, observes, "the mixture of wind with the water and the thunder and storms 
that thismaketh, is noble." 3d edition, Rotterdam, 1687, p. 245. 

c Lord Bacon seems to have been greatly interested in mining and in the reduction, 
compounding and working of metals. In his treatise on the Advancement of Learning 
he divides natural philosophy into the mine and furnace, and philosophers into pioneers 
and smiths, or diggers and hammerers; the former being engaged in the inquisition of 
causes, and the latter in the production of effects. In his " Physiological Remains," we 
find the saving of fuel thus noticed under the head of " Experiments for Profit :" " Build' 
ing of chimneys, furnaces and ovens, to give out heat with less wood." 

53 



418 Branca' s Eolipile. Book IV. 

Three years after Bacon's death, the first printed account was published 
of any modern attempt (yet discovered) to communicate motion to solids 
by steam, and as usual an eolipile was employed. Occupying a place on 
the domestic hearth, as this instrument did, the shrill current proceeding 
from it must have often excited attention, and led ingenious men to ex- 
tend the application of the blast to other purposes. The first idea that 
would occur to a novice when attempting to obtain a rotary movement 
from a current of vapor, would be that of a light wheel, having its wings 
or vanes placed so as to receive the impulse, in a similar manner as little 
paper wheels are made to revolve, which children support on a pin or 
wire and blow round with the mouth — or those which resemble ventila- 
tors and revolve when held against the wind at the end of a stick. These 
toys are vertical and horizontal windmills in miniature, and windmills and 
smoke-jacks were the only instruments in the 16th century that revolved 
by currents of air. Hence it was natural to imitate the movements of 
these in the first applications of steam ; and the more so since steam 
at that time was generally considered to be nothing but air. a Such was 
the device of Giovanni Branca, as described in a work entitled The Ma- 
chine, written in Italian and Latin, and published at Rome in 1629. The 
volume contains sixty-three engravings. The twenty-fifth represents an 
eolipile, in the form of a negro's head, and heated on a brazier : the blast 
proceeds from the mouth, and is. directed against pallets or vanes on the 
periphery of a large wheel, which he thus expected to turn round; and 
by means of a series of toothed wheels and pinions, to communicate mo- 
tion to stampers for pounding drugs. He proposed also to raise water by 
it with a chain of buckets, to saw timber, drive piles, &c. 

It is hardly necessary to observe that the apparatus figured by Branca 
in all probability never existed except in his imagination, and that his 
stampers, buckets, saws, piles, &c. could no more have been moved by 
the blast of his eolipile, than those venerable trees were which Wilkins 
and older writers have represented being torn up from the earth by a man's 
breath — the blast being directed against the vanes of a wheel, and the 
force multiplied by a series of toothed wheels and pinions, until its energy 
could no longer be resisted by the roots. b Branca seems to have had these 
childish dreams in his mind when he proposed a continuous stream oi 
steam from an eolipile, in lieu of intermitting puffs of air from a person's 
mouth. Italian writers have however claimed for him the invention of 
the steam-engine, a claim quite as untenable as that put forth in behalf of 
Decaus ; for, in the first place, his mode of producing a rotary motion by 
a current of vapor was not new : all that can be accorded to him in this 
respect is, that he perhaps was the first to publish a figure and description 
of it. Then it indicates neither ingenuity nor research. There probably 
never was a boy that made and played with " paper windmills" who would 
not have at once suggested it, had he been consulted ; and when eolipiles 
were common, many a lad doubtless amused himself by making his " mills" 
revolve in the current of vapor that issued from them. Moreover, the 
device is of no practical value. How infinitely does it fall short when 
compared with that of Heron, (No. 180.) The philosophical principle of 

a A horizontal and a vertical windmill are figured at folio 49 of Rivius' translation of 
Vitruvins, A. D. 1548. 

b By the multiplication of wheels and pinions itwereeasyto have made, says Wilkins, 
"one of Sampson's hairs that was shaved off, to have been of more strength than all of 
them when they were on : by the help of these arts it is possible, as I shall demonstrate, 
for any man to li ft up the greatest oak by the roots with a straw, to pull ^.t up with a hair, 
or to blow it up with his breath" Math. Magic, book i, chap. 14. 



Chap. 5.] Ramseye's Patent, A.D. 1630. 419 

recoil by which the Alexandrian engineer imparted motion by steam, has 
often been adopted, and engines resembling his are made even at this day; 
but one on the plan of Branca never was, and, without presumption it 
.may be said, never will be. The principle being bad, no modification or 
extension of it could be made useful. No boiler could by it be made to 
work even a pump to inject the necessary supply of water. 

Mr. Farey has well observed that steam has so little density, that the 
the utmost effect it can produce by percussion is very trifling, notwith- 
standing the great velocity with which it moves. The blast issuing from 
an eolipile, or from the spout of a boiling tea-kettle, appears to rush out 
with so much force that at first sight it might be supposed its power, on a 
larger scale, might be applied in lieu of a natural current of wind to give 
motion to machinery ; but on examination it will be found, that the steam 
being less than half the specific gravity of common air, its motion is im- 
peded and resisted by the atmosphere. As steam contains so little matter 
or weight, it cannot communicate any considerable force by its impetus or 
concussion when it strikes a solid body. The force of a current of steam 
also soon ceases. This may be observed in a tea-kettle : the vapor which 
issues with great velocity at the spout, becomes a mere mist at a few inches 
distance, and without any remaining motion or energy ; and if the issuing 
current were directed to strike upon any kind of vanes, with a view of 
obtaining motion from it, the condensation of the steam would be still more 
sudden, because the substance of such vanes would absorb the heat of the 
steam more rapidly than air. 

Branca's apparatus has been made to figure in the history of the steam- 
engine, but with equal propriety might the child's windmill be introduced 
into that of air-engines, for the analogy is precisely the same in both. His 
device had no influence in developing modern engines. Instead of lead- 
ing to the employment of the fluid in close vessels, and to the use of a 
piston and cylinder, its tendency was the reverse : hence so far from indi 
eating the right path, it diverted attention from it. 

At the time Branca was preparing his book for the press, some experi- 
ments on steam were being made in England — or so it would seem from 
Sanderson's edition of Rymer's Foedera. In vol. xix is a copy of a patent 
or special privilege granted by Charles I to David Ramseye, one of the 
grooms of the privy chamber, for the following inventions ; and dated Ja- 
nuary 21, 1630 : 

" 1. To multiply and make saltpeter in any open field, in fower acres 
of ground, sufficient to serve all our dominions. 2. To raise water from 
low pitts by Jire. 3. To make any sort of mills to goe on standing waters, 
by continual motion, without the help of ivind, waite [weight] or horse. 4. 
To make all sorts of tapistrie without any weaving loom, or waie ever yet 
in use in this kingdome. 5. To make boats, shippes and barges to goe 
against strong wind and tide. 6. To make the earth more fertile than 
usual. 7. To raise water from low places, and mynes, and coalpitts, by a 
new waie never yet in use. S. To make hard iron soft, and likewise copper 
to be tuffe and soft, which is not in use within this kingdome. 9. To make 
yellow wax white verie speedilie." The privilege was for fourteen yearsj 
and the patentee was to pay a yearly rent of 31. 6s. Sd. to the king, Mr. 
Farey says that Ramseye had patents for other inventions from Charles I, 
but does not enumerate them. As it was not then customary to file spe- 
cifications, there is no record of the details of his plan. 

It is singular that English writers have passed over this patent almost 
without comment, and yet it contains the first direct proposal to raise water 
in that country by steam of which any account has yet been produced. 



420 Ramsey 'e 's Patent. [Book IV 

It may perhaps be said, that steam is not mentioned; still it is clearly im- 
plied in the second device, and was probably used in the third, fifth and 
seventh. The very expression " to raise water by fire," is the same that 
Porta, Decaus, and other old authors, used when referring to such ap- 
plications of steam. Worcester, Papin, Savery and Newcomen, all de- 
scribed their machines as inventions for " raising water by fire ;" and hence 
they were named "fire water- works," " fire machines," and "fire engines." 
It should moreover be remembered that the word steam was not then irv 
vogue. It is not once used by the translators of the Bible. The fliiid was 
generally referred to as air, or wind, or smoke, according to the appear- 
ances it presented. "Rarefying water into ayer by fier," and similar ex- 
pressions, were common. The idea of air in motion, or wind, was also 
applied to currents of steam : thus we read of "heating water to make 
wind," and eolipiles were designated " vessels to produce wind." From the 
form of clouds which steam assumes when discharged into the atmosphere, 
it was also named smol<e : thus Job calls it, in a passage already quoted; 
and Porta, in describing the apparatus No. 137, speaks of it both as smoke 
and air. " The water [in the bottle] must be kept heated in this way until 
no more of it remains ; and as long as the water shall smo7ce, (sfumera) 
the air will press the water in the box," &c. — and again, "from that you 
can conclude how much water has run out, and into how much air it has 
oeen changed." Had Ramseye therefore called his device a steam ma- 
chine, its nature would not have been so well understood as by the title 
he gave it, if indeed it could have been comprehended at all by the former 
term. The expression "raising water by jire" appears to have as dis- 
tinctly indicated, in the 17th century, a steam-machine, as the term steam- 
engine does now ; and there is no account extant of any device either pro- 
posed or used, in that century, for raising water from wells and mines by 
fire, except it was by means of steam. 

The date of this patent being so near that of the publication of Branca's 
book, it may perhaps be thought that Ramseye derived some crude notions 
from it of applying a blast of steam to drive mills and raise water, as sug- 
gested by the Italian ; but we should rather suppose some modification of, 
or device similar to, Porta's (see page 408) was intended in No. 2, and 
that Nos. 3, 5 and 7 were deduced from it. When once an efficient mode 
of raising water by steam (like No. 187) was realized, some application of 
it to propel machinery would readily occur. We know that both Savery 
and Papin and others proposed to work mills, by discharging the water 
they raised upon overshot wheels ; and this idea was so obvious and na- 
tural, that hundreds of persons have proposed it in later times without 
knowing that it had previously been done. 

From the order in which the first three devices are noticed in the privi- 
lege, it is possible that they were all modifications of the same thing ; that 
the second and third were deduced from the first, and consequently in- 
vented independently of any previous steam machines. The operation of 
making saltpetre or nitre consists principally in boiling, in huge vats or 
cauldrons, the lixivium containing the nitrous earth ; and from the large 
quantities of water and fuel required, was formerly carried on in such 
places only as afforded these in abundance. At such works, the idea of 
employing the vast volumes of vapor (which escaped uselessly into the 
air) to raise the hot, and subsequently cold, liquids, would naturally occur 
to an observing mind, and especially when the subject of raising water by 
steam was exciting attention. Certainly the idea was as likely to occur to 
practical men while engaged in the manufacture of nitre in the beginning 
of the 17th century, as it was to Worcester and others in the middle of it 



Chap. 5.] 



Figure from an old English Work. 



421 



and to Papin and Savery at the close. Perhaps it will be said, nitre was 
not made in England at that time, and therefore Ramseye could not have 
taken the hint from such works ; and that the suggestion could only have 
freen derived from a long practical experience in them, which he probably 
never had. This may be true, and it is not improbable that he was merely 
an agent in the business, having by his influence at court obtained the 
patent for his own as well as the inventor's benefit. The clause attached 
to the 8th device, "not in use withmthis kingdome," implies that they were 
not all of English origin. But whatever were the origin and details of those 
for raising water, it is clear that the subject of steam was then abroad in 
the world, and ingenious men in various parts of Europe were exercising 
their wits to employ it. 

It appears to us from the caption of Ramseye's patent, that No. 2 (raising 
water by fire) was not the first thing of the kind proposed in England, 
since if it were he would have said so, as well as of No. 8, (softening iron 
and copper) — and this further appears from what he remarks of No. 7, 
" raising water from low places, mynes and coal pitts," probably an im- 
provement upon No. 2, and differing from ail previous applications of 
steam for the purpose ; hence we are told that it was a "new waie," one 
"never yet in use" Had not steam therefore been previously applied to 
raise water, it is exceedingly probable that he would have attached a simi- 
lar remark to No. 2. 

The Treatise on Art and Nature, mentioned page 321, is the oldest 
English book we have met with that illustrates 
the raising of water by steam with a cut. The 
annexed figure is from page 30. It possibly 
may have been deduced from the one given by 
Decaus, (No. 185) but we should think not ; 
since, although the volume is a compilation, and 
two thirds of it taken up with "water- works," 
there is nothing except this from which to infer 
even the slightest acquaintance with Decaus's 
book. It seems to have been copied without 
alteration from some other author. It is named 
"A conceited 3 - Lamp, having the image of a cock 
sifting on the top, out of whose mouth by the 
heat of the lamp either water or ayer may be 
sent." The device consists of an eolipile con- 
taining water and heated by a lamp of several 
wicks. The image of the bird is hollow, and 
communicates by a species of three-way cock 
with the steam, and also with a pipe that de- 
scends into the liquid ; so that when the bird is 
turned round till an opening in the moveable 
disk to which its lower part is attached coin- 
cides with another which communicates with 
the steam in the upper part of the vessel, vapor 
issues from the mouth; and when it is turned till the upper orifice of the 
pipe corresponds with the opening in the disk, then hot water is driven 
out ; and when the opening in the disk does not coincide with either, 
nothing can escape. After observing that an opening with a proper stop- 
per should be made in the vessel, to charge it with water, the writer con- 

a No. 45 of Worcester's Century of Inventions, is named "A most conceited Tinder- 
Box ;" No. 71 "A Square Key more conceited than any other;" and No. 74 "Aeon, 
ecitcd Door." 




No. 189. A.D. 1633— 4. 



422 



Raising Water by Steam, from Kircher. [Book IV. 



tinues — " The larger you make this vessel, the more strange it will appear 
in its effects, so the lights [wicks] be proporcionable. Fill the vessell 
halfe full of water, and set the lights on fire underneath it, and after a 
short time, if you turn the holes that are on the sides of the pipes, that 
they may answer one another, the water being by little and little con- 
verted into ayer [steam] by the heat of the lights that are underneath, will 
breath forth at the mouth of the cock : but if you turn the mouth of the 
cock the other way, that the holes at the bottom of the pipes may answer 
each to other, then there being no vent for the ayer to breath out, it will 
presse the water and force it to ascend the pipe, and issue out where the 
ayer breathed out before. This is a thing may move great admiracion in 
the unskilfull, and such as understand it not. Other devices, and those 
much more strange in their effects, may be contrived from hence"* 

Kircher, in 1641, described in his Ars MagneticaP the device for raising 
water figured in the margin, a model of which was found 
in his museum after his death. A close vessel containing 
the water to be elevated is connected by a pipe that pro- 
ceeds from its upper part to the top of the boiler, which 
is supported on a trevet. When the boiler was heated, 
steam ascended through the pipe, and accumulating in the 
upper vessel, forced the water up the jet-pipe as repre- 
sented. 

This, it will be seen, is Porta's machine (No. 187) 
adapted to the operation of raising liquids, which it ex- 
hibits in a very neat and satisfactory manner. It is not 
however equally clear that Kircher had any idea of adapt- 
ing the plan to the draining of mines, or other hydraulic 
purposes in the arts. Had such been the case, he would 
most likely have mentioned it in his Mundus Subterraneus, 
a work published some years afterwards, and in the se- 
cond volume of which he figures and describes the ordi- 
nary machines then in use, viz. the bucket and windlass, 
chain of pots, chain pump, and atmospheric pumps. The 
form of the model (an imitation of a vase supported on a 
column) rendered it an appropriate addition to his phi- 
losophical apparatus. 

In 1643, the great discovery of atmospheric pressure 
was made ; a discovery whose influence, like that of the 
atmosphere itself, is felt more or less in every art and every 
science. It led in a very short time to a series of inventions of the highest 
value, among which the reciprocating steam-engine should probably be 
placed. We mention it here in chronological order, that its influence in 
developing and improving the machine just named may be more readily 
appreciated when we come to notice subsequent attempts to impart motion 
by steam. 




No. 190. Kircher. 
1641. 



a John Bate, who published a treatise on Fire-works in 1635, was perhaps the compiler 
of this curious volume. Strutt, in his Sports and Pastimes of the People of England, 
quotes Bate's book, but it would seem that the same cuts were not in both, for when 
speaking of boys' kites, Strutt observes that the earliest notice of them that he could find 
in books was in an English and French Dictionary of 1690; whereas there is a figure 
of a man flying one, with crackers and other fire-works attached to the tail, in the se- 
cond part of ''Art and Nature." 

b This work was published in quarto, at Rome and Colonne, in 1641 ; and in folio, 
at Rome, in 1654. Catalogue of Kircher's Works at the end of the first volume of 
Mundus Subtcrraneus. Amsterdam, 1665. 



Chap. 5.] Motive Engine in 1651. 423 

Some remarkably ingenious experimentalists nourished about the middle 
of the 17th century, whose names have perished; and of their labors no- 
thing is known, except an enumeration of the uses to which some of their 
inventions could be applied. An example of this is furnished by an ano- 
nymous pamphlet, a published in 1651, from which the following extract is 
taken. The device referred to seems to have possessed every attribute 
of a modern high-pressure engine, and the various applications of the latter 
appear to have been anticipated. " Whereas, by the blessing of God, 
who only is the giver of every good and perfect gift, while I was search- 
ing after that which many, far before me in all humane learning, have 
sought but not yet found, viz. a perpetual motion, or a lessening the dis- 
tance between strength and time ; though I say, not that I have fully ob- 
tained the thing itself, yet I have advanced so near it, that already I 
can, with the strength or helpe of four men, do any work which is done in 
England, whether by winde, water or horses, as the grinding of wheate, 
rape, or raising of water ; not by any power or wisdome of mine own, 
but by God's assistance and (I humbly hope, after a sorte,) immediate di- 
rection, I have been guided in that search to treade in another pathe than 
ever any other man, that I can hear or reade of, did treade before me ; 
yet, with so good success, that I have already erected one little engine, or 
great model, at Lambeth, able to give sufficient demonstration to either 
artist or other person, that my invention is useful and beneficial, (let others 
say upon proof how much more,) as any other way of working hitherto 
known or used." And he proceeds to give " a list of the uses or applica- 
tions for which these engines are fit, for it is very difficult, if not impossi- 
ble, to name them all at the same time. To grind malt, or hard corne ; 
to grind seed for the making of oyle ; to grind colours for potters, painters, 
or glasse-houses ; to grind barke for tanners ; to grind woods for dyers ; 
to grind spices, or snuffe, tobacco ; to grind brick, tile, earth, or stones for 
plaster ; to grind sugar-canes ; to draw up coales, stones, ure, or the like, 
or materials for great and high buildings ; to draw icyre ; to draw water 
from mines, meers, or fens ; to draw water to serve cities, townes, castles; 
and to draw water to flood dry grounds, or to water grounds ; to draw or 
hale ships, boatcs, fyc. up rivers against the stream ; to draw carts, wagons, 
§c. as fast icithout cattel : to draw the plougli without cattel to the same 
despatch if need be; to brake hempe, flax, &c; to weigh anchors with less 
trouble and sooner ; to spin cordage or cables; to bolt meale faster and 
fine ; to saw stone and timber ; to polish any stones or mettals ; to turne 
any great works in wood, stone, mettals, fyc. that could hardly be done be- 
fore ; to file much cheaper in all great icorhs ; to bore wood, stone, mettals ; 
to thrashe corne, if need be; to winnow corne at all times, better, cheaper, 
&c. For paper mills, thread, mills, iron mills, plate mills ; cum multis 
aliis." If this extraordinary engine of motion, observes Mr. Stuart, to 
whom we are indebted for the extract, was not some kind of a steam- 
engine, the knowledge of an equally plastic and powerful motive agent 
has been utterly lost. 

Steam is not here indicated, but it is difficult to conceive any other 
agent, unless some explosive compound be supposed, by which the pres- 
sure of the atmosphere was excited. That the engine consisted of a 
working cylinder and piston, and the latter moved by steam, must we 

a Invention of Engines of Motion lately brought to perfection ; " whereby may be despatch- 
ed any work now done in England, or elsewhere, (especially works that require strength 
and swiftness,) either by water, wind, cattel, or men, and that with better accommoda- 
tion and more profit than by any thing hitherto known and used." London, 1651. 



424 Oliver Evans and John Fitch. [Book IV. 

think be admitted ; for although most of the operations mentioned might 
have been performed by forcing up water on an overshot wheel, by an 
apparatus similar to Papin's or Savery's steam-engines, there are others 
to which such a mode was quite inapplicable, as raising of anchors, or 
propelling carts, wagons and ploughs. The inventor, whoever he was, 
has given proofs of an extraordinary sagacity, for every operation named 
by him is now effected by the steam-engine, except raising the anchors of 
steam-vessels and ploughing. The latter is at present the subject of ex- 
periment, and the former will in all probability be soon adopted. The 
author's labors were most likely not appreciated by his contemporaries, 
and as the world is always too apt to think the worst in such cases, the 
whole will probably now be set down by some persons as the dream of a 
sanguine projector — the judgment commonly passed upon those who are 
in advance of the age they live in. Of this lamentable truth several ex- 
amples will be found in this volume, and in the history of every important 
invention. We shall notice two here, as they relate to two of the most 
valuable applications of steam. Oliver Evans, in 1786, urged upon a 
committee of the legislature of Pennsylvania, the advantages to be derived 
from steam-boats and " steam- wagons," and predicted their universal 
adoption in a short time. The opinion which the committee formed of 
him was expressed a few years afterwards, by one of its members, in the 
following words : " To tell you the truth, Mr. Evans, we thought you 
were deranged when you spoke of making steam-wagons" The other 
relates to John Fitch, a clock and watch maker, than whom a more inge- 
nious, persevering and unfortunate man never lived. In spite of difficulties 
that few could withstand, he succeeded in raising the means to construct 
a steam-boat, which he ran several times from Philadelphia to Burlington 
and Trenton in 1788. As a first attempt, and from the want of proper 
manufactories of machinery at the time, it was of necessity imperfect : 
then public opinion was unfavorable, and the shareholders finally aban- 
doned the scheme. His feelings may be imagined, but not described ; 
for he saw and predicted the glory that awaited the man who should suc- 
ceed in introducing such vessels in more favorable times. " The day will 
come [he observes] when some more powerful man will get fame and 
riches by my invention, but nobody will believe that poor John Fitch can 
do any thing worthy of attention." He declared that within a century 
the western rivers would swarm with steam-vessels, and he expressed a 
wish to be buried on the margin of the Ohio, that the music of marine en- 
gines in passing by his grave might echo over the sods that covered him. 
In a letter to Mr. Rittenhouse, in 1792, he shows the applicability of steam 
to propel ships of war, and asserts that the same agent would be adopted 
to navigate the Atlantic, both for packets and armed vessels. Descanting 
on one occasion upon his favorite topic, a person present observed as Fitch 
retired, " poor fellow! what a pity he is crazy !" He ended his life in a 
fit of insanity by plunging into the Allegany. 3 

In tracing the progress of discovery which resulted in the steam-engine, 
we have seen that the two grand properties of aqueous vapor — its elastic 
energy, and the instant annihilation of this energy by condensation — were 
well known in the 16th century. On these properties of steam were based 
all the efforts of experimenters to accomplish the two great objects they 
had in view; i. e. to impart motion by it to general mechanism, and to 
employ it as a substitute for pumps to raise water. Before either the 

* Supplement to Art. "Steam-Boat," Ed. Encyclopedia, by Dr. Mease; and Watson's 
11 Early Settlement and Progress of Philadelphia," &c. Phil. 1833. 



Chap. 5.] Classification of Modern Steam Engines. 425 

elastic force or the condensation of steam could be beneficially applied to 
give motion directly to solids, some plan very different from that of Branca 
was required — one by which the fluid could be used in close vessels. 
Now there is in the whole range of mechanical combinations but one de- 
vice of the kind yet known, and it has but few modifications, viz. a piston 
and cylinder. Experience has proved, that of all contrivances for trans- 
mitting the force of highly elastic fluids to solid bodies, this is the best. 
Thus guns are cylinders, and bullets are pistons, fitted to fill the bore and 
at the same time to move through the straight barrels. It is the same, 
whatever the impelling agent may be ; whether gun-powder, steam, or 
compressed air. The air-guns of Ctesibius are the oldest machines of 
the kind on record, and from them we see that the ancients had detected 
this mode of employing aeriform fluids. 

« Steam-engines simply considered are but modifications of guns. In the 
latter, the bullet or piston is driven entirely out of the cylinder, and in 
one direction only, because the intention is to impart the momentum to a 
distant object at a blow : but by the former the design is to derive from 
the moving bullet a continuous force ; hence it is not allowed to leave the 
cylinder, but is made to traverse incessantly backwards and forwards 
within. In order to transmit its impetus to the outside of the cylinder 
and to the objects to be acted upon, a straight rod is attached to it, and 
made to slide through an opening in one end of the cylinder. It is by 
means of this rod that motion is imparted to the machinery intended to be 
moved. All the mechanism, the wheels, cranks, shafts, drums, &c. of 
steam-engines are but appendages to the cylinder and piston ; they may 
be removed and the energy of the machine still remains; but take 
away either cylinder or piston and the whole becomes inert as the limbs 
of an animal whose heart has ceased to beat. Therefore it is the working 
cylinder and piston alone that give efficiency to modern steam-engines ; 
and it is to those persons who contributed to introduce them, that the 
glory attending the invention of these great prime movers is chiefly due. 
Whatever may be said respecting more ancient applications of steam as 
a moving power, modern engines are one of the results of the discovery 
of atmospheric pressure. All the early ones of which descriptions are 
extant were rather air than steam machines, not being moved by the latter 
fluid at all. Their inventors had no idea of employing the elastic force 
of steam, but confined themselves to the atmosphere as a source of motive 
force : hence they merely applied steam in lieu of a syringe to displace 
air from a cylinder, that, when the vapor became condensed by cold into 
a liquid, the atmosphere might force down the piston. That this was the' 
way in which modern engines took their rise appears, further, from the 
same feature being retained in a great portion of them to this day. They 
are now ranged in three classes — 1st atmospheric, 2d low pressure, and 3d 
high pressure engines ; and this we know is the order in which they were 
developed. In the first, the power is derived exclusively from the atmos- 
phere, the vapor employed being used only as a substitute for an air-pump 
in making a vacuum under the piston. In process of time the second was 
devised, in which the elastic force of steam is made to act against one side 
of the piston, while a vacuum is formed on the opposite side. The next 
step was to move the piston by the steam alone, and such are named high- 
pressure engines. The term steam-engine is therefore not so definite as 
some persons might suppose, since it is not confined to those in which 
steam is the prime mover. Had it not been for Torricelli's discovery, it 
is possible that we should never have known any other species of steam- 
engine than those of the third class; and hence we repeat, that whatever 

54 



426 



GuerricJcc's Illustration of Atmospheric Pressure. [Book IV. 




No. 191. Guerricke. A. D. 1654. 



may be thought of engines made previous to the 17th century, those of 
modern days were obviously derived from atmospheric ones of the first 
class, while these in their turn were very likely deduced from the appa- 
ratus described in the next paragraph. 

Otto Guerricke, of whom we spoke at page 190, one of the earliest, and 
as far as mechanical ingenuity went perhaps the most gifted, of the early 

elucidators of atmospheric pressure, 
exhibited in his public experiments 
at Ratisbon, in 1654, the following 
application of that pressure as a mo 
tive force. A large cylinder, A, was 
firmly secured to a post or frame. 
It was open at the top and closed at 
the bottom, and had a piston accu- 
rately fitted to work in it. A rope 
was fastened to the piston-rod and 
passed over two pulleys, B C, as rep- 
resented, by which was suspended a 
scale, D, containing several weights. 
When the air was withdrawn from 
the lower part of the cylinder, the 
pressure of the atmosphere depress- 
ed the piston and raised the scale and 
weights. To vary the experiment, 
the weights were removed and 
twenty men were employed to pull 
at the rope with all their strength ; 
but as soon as a vacuum was made by the small air-pump attached to the 
bottom of the cylinder, the piston descended, notwithstanding all their 
efforts to prevent it. 

This is the oldest apparatus on record for transmitting motion to solid9 
by a piston. We can however hardly believe that it was the first devised 
for the purpose. It would be strange if it were ; for whatever may have 
been the nature of Anthemius's, Garay's, and other old machines in 
which steam was the active principle, pumps and syringes had been too 
common, and experiments with them too frequent, for such a device to 
have been unknown. Such men as Aristotle and Archimedes, Ctesibius, 
Heron, Roger Bacon and their successors, were all aware that a syringe 
presented the same phenomenon as Guerricke's apparatus, when the pis- 
ton was drawn up while the discharging orifice was closed : the same 
thing was also observed with common pumps when the suction-pipes were 
either closed or choked. Experiments therefore to illustrate the force 
thus excited were in all probability made, and with apparatus similar to 
that of the Prussian philosopher, long before his time, although no account 
of them is extant. But if even such had been made, they would not lessen 
in any degree the merit of Guerricke, since his experiment undoubtedly 
originated with himself, and all knowledge of similar ones had been lost 
In this device we behold the same moving force, and the same mecha- 
nism for applying it, as were subsequently adopted in steam-engines, which 
at first were little more than copies of this : for example, had a loaded 
pump-rod been suspended to the rope instead of the scale and weights, 
the apparatus would have differed from Newcomen's engine only in the 
mode of exciting the atmospheric pressure. To Guerricke, therefore, is 
due the credit of having not only pointed out the power which alone gave 
efficiency to the first steam-machines, but also of devising the most effec- 



Chap. 6.] Old Inventors concealed their Discoveries, 427 

tual means of employing it. No one could, we think, claim an equal de- 
gree of merit for simply applying (not inventing) another mode of produ- 
cing a vacuum under the piston ; but without insisting on this, it may be 
observed that even at present, in all low-pressure engines, the vacuum is 
made just as G-uerricke made it, viz. by an air-pump; so that the impress 
of his genius on the steam-engine is no more obliterated in this respect 
than it is in others. Every unbiassed mind will therefore admit, that an 
honorable place in its history should be assigned to the philosopher of 
Magdeburg. 



CHAP TER VI 



Reasons of old Inventors for concealing their discoveries — Century of Inventions — Marquis of Wor- 
cester — His Inventions matured before the Civil Wars — Several revived since his death — Problems in 
the "Century" in older authors — Bird roasting itself— Imprisoning Chair — Portable Fortifications — 
Flying — Diving — Drebble's Submarine Ship — The 68th Problem — This remarkably explicit — The device 
consisted of one boiler and two receivers — The receivers charged by atmospheric pressure — Three and 
four-way cocks — An hydraulic machine of Worcester mentioned by Cosmo de Medicis — Worcester's 
machine superior to preceding ones, and similar to Savery's — Piston Steam-Engine also made by him — 
Copy of the last three Problems in the Century — Ingenious mode of stating them — Forcing-Pumps work- 
ed by Steam-Engines intended — Ancient Riddle — Steam-Boat invented by Worcester — Projectors des- 
pised in his time — Patentees caricatured in a public procession — Neglect of Worcester — His death — 
Persecution of his widow — Worcester one of the greatest Mechanicians of any age or nation — Glauber. 

As yet we have not met with any definite description of a steam-engine 
in actual use. This can only be accounted for from the fact that old in- 
ventors were all jealous of the printing-press. They believed their inte- 
rest required concealment on their part, that pirates might not rob them 
of their labors. They have been blamed for this, and so have some mo- 
dern mechanics, but we think without reason ; for, to obtain satisfaction 
at law in such cases, was formerly as difficult as it is now in most cases. 
To have to purchase justice, as in a lottery, with money, is bad in itself, 
and worse because those without money cannot obtain it ; but to have to 
give more for it than it is worth, if perchance it be awarded, is a disgrace 
to enlightened nations — an evil that savages would not for a moment en- 
dure. It is thus that law, though ordained to promote justice, is so pros- 
tituted as not only to defeat the object for which it was designed, but to 
cherish the grossest injustice. It has always been a bar to the progress of 
the arts. The difficulty and expense of obtaining and preserving an ex- 
clusive right to their inventions — that is, to their own property — have in- 
duced inventors more or less, in every age, to conceal their discoveries till 
death, and even then to destroy all records respecting them. 

When old inventors were solicitous of public patronage, instead of es- 
tablishing their claims to it by explaining the principles and operations of 
their machines, they contented themselves with enumerating their uses 
and good qualities merely. They proclaimed the great things that could 
be done, but studiously concealed the modes and means of doing them : 
hence new inventions were sometimes announced enigmatically, the mov- 
ing or constituent principles being so obscurely hinted at that few readers 



428 Marquis of Worcester. [Book IV, 

could apprehend them. Of this mode of exciting public attention, the 
account of the engine of motion in the last chapter is an example ; and 
several more may be seen in the pamphlet published by the Marquis of 
Worcester, in 1663, entitled " A Century of the Names and Scantlings 
[outlines or hints] of such Inventions as at present I can call to mind to 
have tried and perfected ; which, my former notes being lost, I have, at 
the instance of a powerful friend, endeavored, now in the year 1655, to 
to set down in such a way as may sufficiently instruct me to put any of 
them in practice." This book is made up of one hundred inventions, 
numbered from one upwards. It contains a distinct reference to a work- 
ing steam-machine for raising water, and also hints by which its nature 
and construction are pretty clearly ascertained. There is some reason to 
believe that the modern high-pressure engine is also referred to. From 
the circumstance of the author having figured largely in the civil wars, he 
having been an enthusiastic adherent of Charles I. and of monarchy, his 
character and that of his book have been represented in the best and worst 
of lights. By his enemies he was held up as false and unprincipled in 
the highest degree ; by his friends, as chivalrous and of unspotted honor. 
The " Century" has been denounced as a scheme to impose on the cre- 
dulity of mankind — the dream of a visionary — and Hume, in his History, 
goes so far as to name it " a ridiculous compound of lies, chimeras, and 
impossibilities." On the other hand, it has been received by many (and 
generally by practical men) in the light in which the author represents it, 
viz. as a memorial of inventions actually put in practice by him — such as 
he had really " tried and perfected." 

"With the political conduct of Worcester we have nothing to do. He 
naturally enough supported that system by which he and the rest of the 
Lords acquired and entailed their exclusive privileges ; among which the 
abominable one of being legislators by birth was perhaps the most odious 
and unnatural. On the fall of the king he retired to the continent, but, at 
the request of Charles II, ventured to visit London in disguise in 1656. 
Being discovered, he was arrested, and confined in the Tower until the 
reestablishment of monarchy in 1660. He died in 1667. 

We have no positive information respecting the time when he com- 
menced his mechanical researches. There is however reason to believe 
that most, if not all, the inventions enumerated in the "Century" were 
matured before the civil wars broke out, and consequently that the account 
of them was drawn up, as he declares, in 1655. a No. 56 he observes was 
tried before Charles I, Sir William Balfour, and the Dukes of Richmond 
and Hamilton ; and this could not have been later than 1641, for Balfour 
was dismissed that year. In addressing the Century to Parliament, he 
mentions having had " the unparalleled workman, Caspar Kaltoff," in his 
employment " these five and thirty years," and who was at that time 
(1663) engaged in his service. This carries back his experiments to 1628. 
Some of his " water-works" were in operation in his father's castle (at 
Ragland, in Wales) at the commencement of the Long Parliament, (1640) 
for by their sudden movements he is said to have frightened certain adhe- 
rents of the Parliament, who went to search the castle for arms. The na- 
ture of these works is not indicated, except that they consisted of "several 
engines and wheels," and that large quantities of water were contained in 
reservoirs on the top of a high tower. Whether steam was the agent em- 
ployed to raise this water is unknown. It could not have been if the tra- 
dition, credited by some writers, was true, viz. that his attention was first 

a The Century is copied in vol. xiii of Tilloch's Phil. Mag. ; and the editor remarks, 
" this little tract was first published in 1C55." 



Chap. 6.] Century of Inventions. 429 

drawn to the employment of steam by observing, wliile a prisoner in the 
Toiuer, a pot-lid raised or thrown off by it. If this was the case, then no 
dependence can be placed on Worcester's assertion, that the whole Cen- 
tury was written in 1655 ; but there is no reason to question his veracity 
in this respect. On the contrary, the tradition is obviously a fable ; one 
that has been applied to others as well as to him. 

Although many of the devices in the Century appear at first sight ex- 
tremely absurd, and others impossible, yet every year is producing a solu- 
tion of one or more of them. One half, at least, of the number have been 
realized; among which are telegraphs, floating baths, short-hand, combi- 
nation locks, keys, escutcheons and. seals, rasping mills, candle-moulds, 
engines for deepening harbors and docks, contrivances for releasing unruly 
horses from carriages, torpedoes, diving apparatus, floating gardens, bucket 
engines, (see page 64 of this volume) universal lever, repeating guns and 
pistols, double water screws (p. 140 of this vol.) abacus, portable bridges, 
floating batteries &c. besides his applications of steam, which will be no- 
ticed more at large farther on. 

It must not be supposed that Worcester was the first projector of every 
problem in the Century, although his solutions may have been peculiar to 
himself. The greater part may be found in the works of Porta, Fludd, 
Wilkins, and others of his predecessors and contemporaries ; so that the 
charges of absurdity brought against many of them are not attributable to 
him alone. Indeed, the Century is in a great measure free from those 
puerile conceits that abound in old authors.* No. 3 he names "a one-line 
cypher," that is, a character composed of a single line, which by its posi- 
tion was made to represent each and every letter of the alphabet. (Now 
used in short-hand.) No. 4 is an improvement, and consists in substituting 
'points or dots in place of lines. No. 5, " a way by circular motion, either 
along a rule or ringwise, to vary any alphabet, even this of points," &c. 
Now these three systems were explained and illustrated by diagrams in 
detail, twenty-two years before the publication of Worcester's book, by 
Bishop Wilkins, in his " Mercury, or secret and swift Messenger," a tract 
printed in 1641. The eleventh chapter treats " of writing by invented 
characters " — " how to express any sense either by lines, points or jigures." 
The last was by arranging the points or dots in the forms of circles, 
squares, triangles, &c. Wilkins speaks of the whole as an old device. 
Another problem in the Century is " a universal character." This had 
been often attempted, and Wilkins wrote also upon it. Another, " a water- 
ball," to show the hour of the day. There were some singular specimens 
of these clocks in Serviere's museum, which was celebrated for its col- 
lection of mechanical devices, and which doubtless Worcester had often 
visited. (See page 285, and note foot of page .63.) The universal lever, 
No. 26 of the Century, he admits having seen at Venice, and the bucket 
engine (No. 21) at Rome. It is probable he derived his " imprisoning 
chair" from the same place ; for there was in his time, as well as since, a 

a There is a singular one in book xiv of Porta's Magic, " Of a bird which roasts it- 
self;" which, had Worcester mentioned, few would have credited without the explana- 
tion. '• Take a wren and spit it on a hazel stick, and lay it down before the fire, the two 
ends of the hazel spit being supported by something that is firm ; and you r ll see with 
admiration the spit and the bird turn by little and little, without discontinuing, till 'tig 
quite roasted." This, says Ozanum, was first found out by Cardinal Paloti, at Rome. 
The motion may be accounted for on a similar principle as the rotation of glass tubes 
when supported at each end before a fire, and even when inclined against the fire-place 
with one end on the hearth, viz. : the heat, being applied to one side only, causes the 
tubes to bend, and consequently to preponderate and thus turn round. See Phil. Trans, 
vol. xxx — Abridff. vol. x 551. 



430 Century of Inventions. [Book IV. 

famous machine of the kind exhibited in the Borghese villa, which could 
not have escaped his notice. It is described by Blainville as " very art- 
fully contrived; and strangers, who are not acquainted with the trick, are 
infallibly caught as in a trap when they are prevailed upon to sit in it." 
Travels, vol. ii, p. 35. We shall notice a few more: "A little engine 
portable in one's pocket, which placed to any door, without any noise but 
one crack, openeth any door or gate." A similar device is quoted by 
Wilkins from Ramelli, thus : " A little pocket engine wherewith a man 
may break or wrench open any door." (Math. Magic, book i, chap. 13, 
first published in 1648.) Again — " An instrument whereby an ignorant 
person may take any thing in perspective as justly and more than the skil- 
fullest painter can do by the eye." Probably the camera obscura, which 
Baptist Porta had described, about a century before, in his Natural Magic. 
See page 364 of the English translation of 1658, and also Fludd's Natural 
Simia seu Teclmica, 1618, page 308, for another mode. No. 29 of the 
Century relates to "A moveable fortification — as complete as a regular one, 
with half-moons and counterscarps." Such a one is figured in Fludd's 
Simia. It is of a triangular form, with breast works and cannon ranged 
along two sides. The whole is made of thick timber clamped together, 
and moved by horses, which are yoked to a long pole or mast, also sup- 
ported on wheels and attached to the rear or base of the triangle, so as 
to be out of the reach of shot from the enemy. The horses have their 
faces to the fortification, just as if yoked to the pole of a common carriage 
and fronting it — or, according to the old saying, " the cart is put before 
the horse." 

His modes of discoursing by knotted strings, gloves, sieves, lanterns, 
&c. are similar to others mentioned in the Natural Magic of Porta, and in 
other works. Wilkins's Secret and Swift Messenger also contains much 
curious information on such subjects. Several numbers of the Century 
relate to repeating guns. These, as is well known, exercised the wits of 
inventors long before his time. Porta, in his Magic, book xii, speaks of 
" great and hand guns, discharged ten times" although loaded but once. 
They are even of much older date. Sometimes several barrels were joined 
together. The " arithmetical instrument, whereby persons ignorant of 
arithmetic may perfectly observe numerations and subtractions of all sums 
and fractions," was in all probability the abacus, or Chinese sv;an-j>an, now 
used in schools. 

Flying and diving, also mentioned by him, have occupied the ingenuity 
of inventors in every age. Cornelius Drebble constructed a diving-vessel 
which was propelled by oars worked through openings in the sides. Short 
conical tubes of leather, through which the oars were passed, were con- 
nected to the openings so as to exclude the water ; hence the joints some- 
what resembled those of the feet of a tortoise when protruded from the 
shell. The vessel was lowered by admitting water, and raised by pump- 
ing it out. (The distance of diving- vessels below the surface is easily and 
accurately ascertained by a curved tube containing a little mercury, one 
end being within the vessel and the other without.) Charles, Landgrave 
of Hesse Cassel, hearing of Drebble's diving-ship, requested Papin to 
contrive one. Papin's machine is figured and described in the Gentleman's 
Magazine for 1747, page 581. Drebble's vessel did not require a constant 
supply of fresh air, for he had, or pretended to have, an elixir in a small 
vial, a few drops of which restored the vitiated air so as to make it again 
fit for respiration. Something of this kind was known even before Dreb- 
ble's time, if we may judge from one of several illustrations of diving in 
the old German translation of Vcgetius, A. D. 1511. A man clothed in. 



Chap. 6.] Worcester's 68th Proposition. 431 

a dress of thin skin or oiled silk fitted close to his body, and covering every 
part except his head and hands, is represented walking on the bottom of 
a river. In his left hand he holds a leathern flask, through the contracted 
neck of which he is drawing a portion of the contents with his mouth. 
Wilkins devoted a chapter of his Math. Magic to diving. He notices 
Drebble's machine, and many other curious devices ; so that on this sub- 
ject Worcester had an abundance of materials and hints to work upon. 

No. 50 of the Century relates to portable ladders. A variety of these 
are figured in the old translation of Vegetius just referred to. There are 
several other things named in the Century which might be traced to older 
sources, but it is not necessary ; for Worcester has not, that we are aware 
of, ever claimed all the devices he has named. He mentions two whose 
authors he recollected, but as the account was drawn up from memory, he 
could hardly recall to mind the sources whence all were derived. He 
says they were such as he could call to mind to have tried and perfected : 
he does not say invented. While many originated with himself, others 
were such as he improved only. That he had sources of information 
which have not been discovered, there can be little doubt. Of the thou- 
sands of old treatises on the " Mysteries of Nature and Art," a staple sub- 
ject, and title too, from Roger Bacon to Moxon, how few are extant ! 
But some will perhaps yet be met with on the shelves of antiquaries and 
the lovers of old books in Europe. , 

Those numbers of the Century which relate to steam are 6S, 98, 99 and 
100 ; but it is in 68 only that steam is clearly indicated. The device is 
named " a fire water work," and is described' in the following manner : 
"An admirable and most forcible way to drive up water by fire, not by 
drawing or sucking it upwards, for that must be, as the philosopher calleth 
it, Infra sphceram activitatis, which is but at such a distance. But this 
way hath no bounder, if the vessels be strong enough ; for I have taken a 
piece of a whole cannon, whereof the end was burst, and filled it three 
quarters full of water, stopping and screwing up the broken end, as also 
the touch- hole ; and making a constant fire under it, within twenty-four 
hours it burst, and made a great crack : — So that having a way to make 
my vessels, so that they are strengthened by the force within them, and 
the one to fill after the other, I have seen the water run like a constant 
fountain stream forty feet high. One vessel of water rarefied by fire 
driveth up forty of cold water ; and a man that tends the work is but to 
turn two cocks, that, one vessel of water being consumed, another begins 
to force and refill with cold water, and so successively, the fire being 
tended and kept constant, which the self same person may likewise abun- 
dantly perform in the interim, between the necessity of turning the said 
cocks." 

We here see clearly what was meant by Ramsey e and others when 
they spoke of raising water hy fire, viz. that it was by steam, which the 
fire was employed to produce. It will be perceived that Worcester does 
not here claim to be the first to raise water in large quantities in this man- 
ner, thus tacitly admitting that he was aware of previous applications of 
steam for the purpose. Had he indeed made such a claim, little reliance 
could have been placed on his statements ; but, notwithstanding all that 
has been said to the contrary, we have seen nothing in the whole tenor of 
his conduct with regard to his inventions to shake our confidence in his 
sincerity. In one respect No. 6S differs from the rest, viz. in the detail 
with which the device is described ; but this was most likely designedly 
done, in order to show its superiority over other " fire water-works," and 
to point out where it differed from them. Had it been an original idea, 



432 Worcester's 6Sth Proposition. [Book IV. 

there could have been no more inducement to be thus explicit than with 
the rest ; but being of the same nature as others, he would naturally be 
- led to notice the difference. Some writers are incredulous of his having 
ever put it in practice, notwithstanding his assertions, and the particulars 
he has specified ; and they further contend that his description was not 
sufficiently perspicuous to enable a person to make such a machine in his 
own time, and is not now. To neither of these positions can we assent ; 
and the latter, if true, does not affect the character of Worcester, either 
for veracity or ingenuity, since the avowed design of the Century was 
rather to enable himself than others to realize the inventions named. 

The description appears not only that of a machine in actual use, and 
from which a similar one might have been made, but, as just intimated, 
some particulars are mentioned apparently with the sole view of distin- 
guishing it from other devices of the same kind. Had he given a figure 
we should have learnt more of the details, but not of the general plan. 
The nature of the force employed (the expansive power of steam) he 
shows in the clearest light ; and its irresistible energy is admirably illus- 
trated by bursting the cannon : indeed, he could not possibly have se- 
lected any thing better adapted for the purpose. Few writers however 
believe the experiment was ever made, from the seeming difficulty of 
closing the broken end — a circumstance which, perhaps more than any 
other, has led people to doubt the accuracy of other of his statements : and 
it must be admitted that if he is not to be believed in this, his assertions in 
general must be received with great caution. But v/hat great difficulty 
after all was there in driving a plug tight into the smoothly bored although 
broken end of a cannon, and securing the plug effectually in its place, by 
iron straps and screws round the trunnions % Lest the idea of danger 
should be connected with his apparatus in the public mind, he remarks 
that he had a way of preventing his vessels from being exploded. He 
mentions at least three vessels ; one, a boiler in which to generate steam, 
the others, to receive the water previously to its being raised. A separate 
boiler shows that the apparatus was a modification of Porta's and Kircher's, 
(Nos. 1S7, 190) — and lest any one should suppose that the water was re- 
quired to be heated before it was elevated, he states distinctly that it was 
not : hence his device bore no resemblance to that of Decaus, (No. 188) — 
so far from it that the boiler, or " one vessel rarefied by fire," forced up 
forty times its contents " of cold water." It appears that the water was 
raised forty feet only ; perhaps being limited to that height by local cir- 
cumstances, or by the building in which the apparatus was erected. The 
pressure of steam in his boiler did not therefore much exceed 301bs. on 
the inch. As the elevation exceeded that to which the liquid could be 
raised by atmospheric pressure, he also takes occasion to notice distinctly 
that it was not done by sucking ; and in this he possibly may allude to 
some such modes of raising water, viz. by using the steam only to produce 
a vacuam, and to show the difference ; for, by employing its elastic force, 
he could raise water at one lift to any height, and his apparatus, instead 
of a limited application, was adapted to mines and pits of every depth, 
and hence he appropriately names it " a most forcible way." The receiving 
vessels were charged or filled " one after another," and the stream dis- 
charged from them was uninterrupted. One person only was required to 
attend to the fire under the boiler and " to turn two cocks," i. e. to admit 
steam alternately into each receiver, so that when one was " consumed " 
or emptied, the contents of the other began to " force " or be forced up, 
and the empty one to " fill " or be refilled with cold water, " and so suc- 
cessively." The vessels were large, or it took a long time to fill them, 



Chap. 6.] Three and four way Cocks. 433 

since the man had abundant time to attend the fire in the intervals of turn- 
ing the cocks. 

Notwithstanding the comprehensive sketch that Worcester has given 
of this machine, a variety of opinions prevails respecting some of its parts, 
and the arrangement of the whole. In these respects scarcely two writers 
agree, while some differ widely. Some have supposed it to have consisted 
of two eolipiles, like those of Heron or Decaus, (Nos. 179 and 188) con- 
nected to one ascending pipe, (see Galloway on the Steam-Engine) — an 
idea, we think, entirely out of the way, since such a plan would possess 
neither " merit " nor " originality,'' which the writer just named accords 
to Worcester's device. It is moreover opposed to the description given, 
which expressly states that the contents of one vessel rarefied by fire, 
driveth up forty of cold water ; whereas, by the supposed construction, 
all the water must have been heated to the boiling point before it could 
have been elevated at all, and to a temperature still higher before it was 
raised forty feet. 

The principal point undetermined is the mode by which the receivers 
were charged. Were they so placed that the water flowed into them 
through a pipe and cock 1 ? Or, were they wholly immersed in the tank, 
well or pond, and furnished with valves opening inwards for the admis- 
sion of the liquid, and to prevent its return when the steam was turned 
on ] Or, were they placed above the water, and charged by atmospheric 
pressure % The first and second modes have been suggested, because 
Worcester says he did not raise the liquid by " sucking ;" but it does not 
appear that he meant any thing more than that the contents of the receivers 
were not expelled from them in this way. As the elevation to which 
water could be raised at one lift by his machine was only limited by the 
strength of the vessels, he very naturally observed, to remove an objection 
which he foresaw might be made to his assertion, that this was not effected 
by sucking, but by forcing the liquid up. His plan bears the same relation 
to a forcing pump, as using steam to produce a vacuum in a receiver does 
to a sucking one ; and in distinguishing between the two applications of 
the vapor to raise water, viz. by its condensation and its expansion, he 
uses the same terms that we do to show the difference between the two 
instruments just named. Of a forcing pump we say, it does not raise 
water by atmospheric pressure, but in opposition to it ; and that the ele- 
vation is only limited by the strength of the materials and the power em- 
ployed : now every person acquainted with the subject knows, that it, m 
the expulsion of the water from the cylinder that is referred to, not the 
mode of filling it ; for almost invariably are the vessels or cylinders of 
forcing pumps charged by sucking, and so they were in Worcester's time. 
If the receivers were placed below the reservoir that supplied them, 
and were fed from it by a pipe, then as there were but two cocks used, 
they must have been such as are known by the term " three-way," — one 
passage to supply steam to each of the receivers, and the other water. 
There is no difficulty in admitting this, for both three and four way cocks 
were in use ages before Worcester's days. They are described in the 
Spiritalia, (problem 31) in Besson's Theatre, Fludd's Simia, (see our 160th 
illustration, page 354) Ozanam's Recreations, and in several other old au- 
thors. One form of them is seen at page 421. Tavernier found, in baths 
of the east, cocks which at the same mouth supplied '** either hot water or 
cold," (Relation of the Seraglio) and they are described and figured in the 
Forcible Movements of Decaus : thus prop, xix of Leak's translation is 
" Of the cock with four vents," and its application is shown in a self-acting 
*' Phneumatique Engine." M. Arago is therefore greatly mistaken, in his 

55 



434 Worcester's Machine seen by Cosmo de Medicis. [Book IV 

History of the Steam-Engine, in attributing the invention of the four-way 
cock to Papin. In his zeal to confer honor on the philosopher of Blois, 
he inadvertently overlooked the old engineer of Normandy. 

This plan of supplying Worcester's receivers is certainly far more 
probable than that of burying them in the water they were to raise. In- 
deed, we cannot perceive how the latter could answer at all, as the steam 
would be condensed by the surrounding medium almost as fast as it en- 
tered the receivers ; so that instead of " one vessel of water rarefied by 
fire " driving up forty of cold water, it would hardly be able to drive up 
any. It appears to us impossible for ingenuity to suggest a worse plan, 
and yet several writers have adopted it. a As a proof that Worcester had 
an engine at work somewhat similar to the one referred to in his 68th 
proposition, the following extract from the Journal of Cosmo de Medicis, 
who visited England in the 17th century, has been adduced : " His high- 
ness, that he might not lose the day uselessly, went again, after dinner, to 
the other side of the city, extending his excursion as far as Vauxhall, be- 
yond the palace of the Archbishop of Canterbury, to see an hydraulic 
machine invented by my Lord Somerset, Marquis of Worcester. It raises 
water more than forty geometrical feet, by the power of one man only ; 
and in a very short space of time will draw up four vessels of water 
through a tube or channel not more than a span in width ; on which ac- 
count it is considered to be of greater service to the public than the other 
machine near Somerset-House." Now if this engine for raising water 
from the Thames, and which was managed by one man, was moved by 
steam — and it probably was — we may rest assured that Worcester knew 
better how to charge his receivers than by immersing them in the river, 
or in any tank supplied from it. Had he done so, the machine would 
never have been "considered of greater service to the public" than the 
engine at Somerset-House, which was worked by horses, and distributed 
water over " a great part of the city." (This last engine most likely con- 
sisted of pumps, such as were erected by Bulmer in 1594. See page 296.) 
As four vessels are here mentioned, there were probably that number of 
receivers employed. 

It would be strange if Worcester's receiving vessels were not charged 
by atmospheric pressure, considering the examples he had before him. 
To say nothing of this well known mode of charging eolipiles, and other 
vessels represented in the Spiritalia, (see 173 and 177 of our illustrations) 
both Porta and Fludd exhibited experiments expressly to show how water 
is raised into a vacuum formed by the condensation of vapor, (page 407) 
and Decaus gives such striking applications of it (page 380) that Worcester 
never could, with a knowledge of these, have plunged his receivers under 
water. But was he acquainted with the writings of these men 1 Unques- 
tionably he was. There is evidence in the Century that he examined 
every source of information, both at home and abroad, and with an eager- 
ness that has perhaps seldom been equalled; and then no person had greater 
facilities for ascertaining what had been accomplished. He was not a man 
to set about devising new modes of raising water while ignorant of old 
ones, or without perusing those writings which treated directly or indi- 
rectly upon the subject. Of all his researches, this of raising water was 

a See Millington's Epitome of Philosophy, and Stuart's Descriptive History of the 
Steain-Engine. The last named writer speaks however very differently in his valuable 
" Anecdotes of the Steam-Engine." Further reflection convinced him that Worcester 
was something more than a charlatan, and the machine in question very unlike the one 
represented in his previous work. 



Chap. 6.] Opinions respecting the QSth Proposition. 435 

among the earliest and most favorite, as it was the last and. most important ; 
and it was impossible for him and Kaltoff to have spent so many years as 
they did on this and other subjects, without improving old devices and 
introducing new ones. Then he was most likely acquainted with the ma- 
' chines of Bacon, and with those of Ramseye, and with Ramseye himself, 
and Bushell too ; and also with the engine of motion noticed in the last 
chapter, of which he was possibly both the inventor and describer. So 
far therefore from Worcester's machine being imperfect, as some writers 
have supposed, we are justified in believing it was superior in its general 
plan, and in the arrangement and execution of its several parts, to any 
thing then extant, or previously proposed. 

It would be easy to devise a machine corresponding with these remarks 
and coinciding with the Marquis's account ; but the intelligent reader is 
aware that it would be substantially the same as Savery's. It is surprising 
that some authors have supposed Worcester could not have filled his ves 
sels by atmospheric pressure, because, say they, the production of a vacuum 
by the condensation of steam was not then known, " nor even thought 
of." But such writers were not aware of the experiments of Porta, and 
they forgot the employment of eolipiles. It has also been said that a ma- 
chine as perfect as Savery's, and one in which steam acted on a piston, 
was beyond the state of the arts in Worcester's days. The Century of 
Inventions is a proof to the contrary, and so is the Collection of Serviere. 
Every problem in the one, and every device in the other, indicates great 
excellence of design and ability of execution ; and both are replete with 
proofs of mechanical skill as well as fertility of invention. 

To realize Worcester's machine, it is contended that we must depend 
upon what he has said, and on nothing more. But those who prescribe 
this rule do not themselves adhere to it ; and by following it, posterity 
could hardly comprehend a modern device from its modern description. 
As Worcester has not mentioned pipes or valves, neither of these essential 
elements of his apparatus could, by such a rule, be admitted : and if his 
words are to be construed literally, he employed two score of receivers ; 
and these were also elevated as well as the water within them : " one 
vessel of water rarefied by fire driveth up forty [vessels] of cold water." 
By the same rule it was the boiler, not the steam within it, (he never men- 
tions steam) that drove them up. Then there is the condensation of the 
steam in a receiver, after expelling the liquid, which is also not mentioned; 
and of course the vessel could not again be filled until this had taken place. 
On the same ground, a cock, tunnel and pipe or pump to feed the boiler, 
and a furnace door and grate bars, might be considered gratuitous addi- 
tions, since none of them are mentioned. 

Perhaps the most obscure part of the 6Sth problem, is that which relates 
to strengthening the vessels " by the force within them." Some persons 
suppose this refers to the figure of the vessels — others, to interior braces. 
The latter is the most reasonable, but seems hardly reconcilable with the 
the text, since the same term {force) is used as that by which the active 
power which rent the gun is designated. 

Notwithstanding the ambiguous manner in which Worcester drew up 
his Century of Inventions, there are strong indications of his having im- 
parted motion to a piston by steam, and that upon this he depended for 
being known to posterity. This was the crown of his glory as an inventor 
— the primary element in the " semi-omnipotent engine," which supported 
him under the contumely and neglect that he met with. Unfortunately 
for his fame, the state of the arts was not sufficiently advanced to convince 
his contemporaries of the importance of " the great machine," and it was 

53 



436 Last three Propositions in the Century of Inventions. [Book IV 

left for a future age to adopt. It does not appear equally clear that he 
was the first thus to use steam. From the description of the engine of 
motion mentioned at page 423, and the third and fifth devices in Ramseye's 
patent, it would seem that a working cylinder had been in previous use ; 
nor do we see how the experimenters of the 17th and previous centuries, 
when seeking for modes of employing steam as a motive agent, could miss it 
any more than their successors. It is one of those devices that would be 
detected by such men in every age, just as it has been by the makers of 
pumps and piston bellows, Fludd, Hoell, Belidor and Westgarth, all 
employed a piston and cylinder in pressure engines ; and some of them 
were not aware of their having been employed before in such machines. 
Guerricke, Papin and Newcomenat once adopted them in atmospheric en- 
gines, Hautefeuille in explosive engines, and Watt and others in those moved 
by steam ; and why not Garay, Ramseye and Worcester ] And even the 
troublesome neighbor of Zeno also % It required no great sagacity in 
Worcester to apply steam to move the loaded piston in Fludd's pressure 
engine, (page 354) and so simple an idea could hardly escape him after 
he had turned his attention to impart motion by steam. Indeed, he uses 
an expression which implies that it was a loaded piston to which he gave 
motion. But even if this idea escaped both Ramseye and Worcester, the 
apparatus of Guerricke so clearly exhibited the mode of applying steam 
to move a piston, that the latter could not possibly have remained any 
longer ignorant of it. 

When the three following propositions in the Century are duly consider- 
ed, every candid mind will, we think, admit that he was really in possession 
of an engine similar to Leopold's, or to Newcomen's, or to the single 
acting one of Watt : — 

u 98. An engine, so contrived, that working the primum mobile forward 
or backward, upward or downward, circularly or cornerwise, to and fro, 
streight, upright, or downright, yet the pretended operation continueth, 
and advanceth, none of the motions above-mentioned hindering, much less 
stopping, the other ; but unanimously and with harmony agreeing, they 
all augment and contribute strength unto the intended work and opera- 
tion ; and, therefore, I call this a semi-omnipotent engine, and do intend 
that a model thereof be buried with me. 

" 99. How to make one pound weight to raise an hundred as high as 
one pound falleth, and yet the hundred pound descending doth what no- 
thing less than one hundred pound can effect. 

" 100. Upon so potent a help as these two last-mentioned inventions, a 
water-work is, by many years experience and labor, so advantageously 
by me contrived, that a child's force bringeth up, an hundred foot high, 
an incredible quantity of water, even two foot diameter, so naturally, that 
the work will not be heard, even into the next room ; and with so great 
ease and geometrical symmetry, that though it work day and night, from 
one end of the year to the other, it will not require forty shillings repara- 
tion to the whole engine, nor hinder one day's work ; and I may boldly 
call it the most stupendous work in the whole world : not only, with little 
charge, to drain all sorts of mines, and furnish cities with water, though 
never so high seated, as well as to keep them sweet, running through 
several streets, and so performing the work of scavengers, as well as fur- 
nishing the inhabitants with sufficient water for their private occasions ; 
but likewise supplying rivers with sufficient to maintain and make them 
portable from town to town, and for the bettering of lands all the way it 
runs ; with many more advantageous and yet greater effects of profit ad- 
mirable and consequence. So that deservedly I deem this invention to 



Chap. 6.] Piston Steam-Engine described by Worcester. 437 

crown my labours, to reward my expences, and make my thoughts acqui- 
esce in way of further inventions ; this making up the whole century, and 
preventing any further trouble to the reader for the present, meaning to 
leave to posterity a book, wherein, under each of these heads, the means to 
'put in execution, and visible trial, all and every of these inventions, with 
the shape and form of all things belonging to them, shall be printed by 
brass plates." 

To an ordinary reader all this appears preposterous, nor without the 
key can any satisfactory interpretation be given. The first seems incre- 
dible, the second impossible, and the third a proof of mental alienation. 
But in considering them it should be kept in mind, that Worcester's design 
was to explain the effects and uses of the mechanism he here refers to, 
and at the same time to conceal the moving principle. This he has accom- 
plished in the happiest manner ; and in doing it, has furnished a specimen 
of ingenuity, and of the fertility of his genius, almost equal to the inven- 
tions themselves. The three problems certainly refer to a cylindrical 
steam-engine raising water by means of a pump. In No. 98 he speaks 
of steam only : this was the yrimum mobile whose effect was the same in 
whatever direction it was conveyed to the piston ; i. e. whether through 
ascending, descending, curved, angular or straight tubes, or through a 
number of them meeting in the cylinder from every imaginable direction ; 
the steam from one not interfering with, or being counteracted by, that 
from others, but the whole " unanimously and with harmony agreeing, 
they all augment and contribute strength unto the intended work and 
operation," viz. in pushing the piston along. It seems impossible for 
Worcester to have selected a feature of aeriform fluids better adapted 
for his purpose, or to have made use of it more skillfully. In concealing 
his meaning by riddles, he seems to have equalled the most expert among 
the ancients.* In No. 99 he plays in a similar style upon the piston, and 
has contrived with admirable tact to contradict (apparently) one of the 
most palpable maxims in mechanics, and thus to divert prying curiosity 
into a wrong track. The piston was attached by its rod to one end of a 
working-beam, and a loaded pump-rod to the other, so that when the 
steam was turned on, the small piston (which he compares to one pound) 
was pushed down, and consequently the heavy pump-rod, or the water 
raised by it, (compared to a hundred pounds) elevated " as high as the 
one pound falleth." In No. 100 he opens his views still further by stating 
it to be a water-work, for draining " all sorts of mines, and furnishing cities 
with abundance of water, though never so high seated," and that its action 
depended upon the two last mentioned inventions (Nos. 98 and 99.) In 
other words, he here contemplates the pump and steam-engine as a whole; 
but lest the device should be too easily apprehended, he throws in a dash 
of the enigmatical, declaring it was so contrived " that a child's force 
bringeth up, an hundred foot high, an incredible quantity of water, even 
[a column] two foot diameter ;" that is, a child could by a lever open and 
close the cocks, or valves, by which steam was admitted into the cylinder. 
The uniformity of the movements of a steam-engine, and the little noise 
attending them, — its working incessantly night and day, and the trifling 
expense required to keep it in repair, are now well understood. 

a Of ancient riddles, that of the Sphynx is one of the neatest. What animal is it that 
walks on four legs in the morning, on two at noon, and on three in the evening ? CEdipus 
explained it. The animal, he said, was man, who in the morning of life (in infancy) 
crept on his hands and feet, at the noon of life walked erect, and in the evening of his 
days supported himself with a stick. 



438 Steam Boat devised by Worcester. [Book IV 

Nothing more is necessary to convince us that Worcester here speaks 
of a steam-engine working a pump. No other solution can be given — no 
other conclusion arrived at. No one could have written and spoken as he 
has done without having either seen or possessed a steam engine. Of its 
value he was fully aware ; for in the patent granted by Parliament in 
1663 to himself and his heirs for the long term of ninety years, those who 
pirated the invention were to forfeit five pounds for every hour they used 
it. He tells us that it was the result of u many years experience and 
labor," and when it was complete, he poured out his feelings in an ad- 
dress to the Deity, a copy of which was found among his papers, entitled 
" The Lord Marquis of Worcester's ejaculatory and extemporary thanks- 
giving prayer, when first with his corporeal eyes he did see finished a 
perfect trial of his water-commanding engine, delightful and useful to 
whomsoever hath in recommendation either knowledge, profit or pleasure." 
Can any one suppose he here was mocking his Creator, when, in the pri- 
vacy of his closet, he prayed that he might not be " puffed up " with the 
knowledge of this great machine, and returned thanks next to his creation 
and redemption " for an insight into so great a secret of nature," and finally 
desired no greater monument than to have one buried with him 1 Some 
men have lost their reason by the excitement attending their discoveries. 
Pythagoras offered a hecatomb to the gods, and Archimedes ran naked 
through the streets of the city. Worcester acted more like a philosopher 
and a Christian. Had he imitated the Syracusan, he had probably been 
more successful in securing attention to his discoveries. 

From the latter part of the 99th proposition, we infer that Worcester 
used a forcing pump, as he intimates that the effect was produced by the 
descent of a weight (on the pump-rod,) not by its ascent ; and this agrees 
with the description and figures of old water-engines. In ** Art and Na- 
ture," published as before observed in 1633—4, they consist of forcing 
pumps worked by large tread and other wheels — i. e. the pistons are raised 
by these but are carried down by their own weight, or that of weights 
with which they are loaded. These weights were sometimes attached to 
the rod, at others to the end of the working-beams to which the rods were 
connected ; and hence they were named " beetle-beams," from their re- 
semblance to a large hammer. Loading the piston-rod of pumps did not 
therefore originate with Moreland or Newcomen, since the practice 
was older even than Worcester. The piston in Fludd's pressure 
engine is an example. Such pistons were named " heavie forcers," (a 
solid piston being named " a forcer," and the upper box of a common 
pump " a sucker.") 

As Worcester is believed to have applied steam to work a pump, it will 
be asked, did he not perceive its application as a mover of machinery in 
general — to propel boats, &c. % Yes ; and he has left a proof of this also. 
In a manuscript (see Stuart's Anecdotes, vol. i, 56) he observes, speaking 
of the device No. 99, " I can make a vessel of as great a burden as the 
river can bear, to go against the stream, which the more rapid it is, the 
faster it shall advance, and the moveable part that works it, may be by 
one man still guided to take advantage of the stream and yet to steer the 
boat to any point ; and this engine is applicable to any vessel or boat 
whatsoever, without being therefore made on purpose ; and it worketh 
these effects : it roweth, it draweth, it driveth (if need be) to pass London 
Bridge against the stream at low water ; and a boat laying at anchor, the 
engine may be used for loading and unloading." Besides the Century, 
Worcester published what he called "An exact and true Definition of the 
most stupendous Water-commanding Engine, invented by the Right Ho* 



Chap. 6.] Old Patentees caricatured. 439 

nourable, (and deservedly to be praised and admired), Edwavd Somerset, 
Lord Marquis of Worcester, and by his lordship himself presented to his 
most excellent Majesty Charles the Second, our most gracious Sovereign." 
. This was a tract of twenty-two pages, and is supposed to have been printed 
for the purpose of forming a company to introduce the device. It is writ- 
ten in the same style as the Century, and instead of describing the machine 
is confined to an enumeration of its properties. 

In Worcester's day, patents for useful inventions were often classed 
with the most unrighteous monopolies, and the holders of them held in 
general contempt. This may serve to account in some measure for the 
neglect that Ramseye and Worcester's projects met with. The abomina- 
ble abuse which Elizabeth, James and Charles made of the power to grant 
patents, excited general disgust. Courtiers and others obtained monopo- 
lies for nearly all the chief branches of trade, and sold rights in them to 
others, so that prices were raised to an exorbitant height. Had patents 
been confined to new inventions, the result would have been beneficial ; 
but exclusive grants were obtained to work and sell the commonest articles, 
as salt, iron, lead, coals, and even bones and rags : with the monopolists 
of these, (harpies and horseleeches as Elizabeth once called them) the au- 
thors of discoveries and improvements in the useful arts were confounded. 
En a masquerade got up for the entertainment of Charles I, in 1633, 
(among the managers of which were Noy the Attorney General, Sir John 
Finch and Mr. Selden) were several flings at monopolies, as hints for the 
king. In the " Antimasque of Projectors," says Maitland, " rode a fellow 
upon a little horse, with a great bit in his mouth ; and upon the man's 
head was a bit, with head-stall and reins fasten'd, and signified a projector 
who begged a patent, that none in the kingdom might ride their horses, but 
with such bits as they should buy of him. Then came another fellow 
with a bunch of carrots upon his head, and a capon upon his fist, describ- 
ing [representing] a projector who begged a patent of monopoly, as the 
first inventor of the art to feed capons with carrots ; and that none but 
himself should make use of that invention ; and have the privilege for 
fourteen years, according to the statute." 

Putting out of view his political conduct, the fate of Worcester resem- 
bled that of great inventors in almost every age. In some respects it was 
peculiarly severe. The heir of one of the richest and most powerful fami- 
lies of the land, he devoted his wealth and his energies, for more than one 
third of a century, to useful discoveries ; and in his old age he was re- 
duced to borrow small sums to meet his necessities ; — and when at last 
the profligate Charles was restored, although Worcester recovered his 
demesne, his dwellings, furniture, papers, models and machines had all 
been destroyed, and he was overwhelmed with debt. Still his energies 
were stimulated by a consciousness of the importance of his inventions, 
but which, alas ! his contemporaries were unable to appreciate, except by 
insinuations that they were the fruits of a partial insanity. Finally death 
stept in and closed his labors forever. Then it was that his widow, who 
was fully sensible of the value of his great machine, used her exertions 
to introduce it ; but her confessor, a Roman Catholic priest, expostulated 
with her on the folly and sin of her conduct, and solemnly declared to 
her u on the faith of a priest," that if she did not cease her endeavors, she 
would not only lose the favor of heaven, but the use of her reason ! She 
died in 1681, and the evil genius of Worcester did not even then cease 
its persecutions ; for posterity, which generally corrects the errors of con- 
temporaries, has not yet done justice to his memory. While a few writers 
admit the value and originality of his inventions, and account him one of 



440 Secret from Glauber. [Book IV 

the chief authors of the steam-engine, others condemn the " Century " as 
a mass of absurdities, and deny his ever having constructed a steam-ma- 
chine at all. Those persons however who entertain the latter opinion, 
evince as much credulity as others, for they cannot deny that he has des- 
cribed the peculiar properties of the great cJief d' ceuvre of human ingenuity 
(a high-pressure steam-engine) with a degree of accuracy of which history 
affords no parallel ; and hence, if he lacked truth he possessed prescience, 
and while they reject him as an inventor, they must admit him as a 
prophet. 

In the annals of the arts, there is not to be found a more singular exam- 
ple of devotion to their improvement, either as regards the number of 
years or the amount of treasure spent, the importance of the results or the 
ardor with which they were pursued, and the efforts made to excite public 
attention to them. Whatever others may have done before him, they left 
no account of their labors. Worcester is the first to communicate with 
the public by means of the press, and to give a tangible description (al- 
though an intentionally obscure one) of his discoveries — (for we do not 
reckon either the device of Branca or Decaus among such.) On this ac- 
count alone he is entitled to the praise of every modern engineer ; and 
had he but fulfilled his promise of leaving detailed accounts illustrated 
with engravings, his fame would have endured as long as the steam-engine 
itself. If he were not the great magician who evoked the mighty spirit 
that lay dormant in steam — who pointed out its power and. the means of 
employing it — who revived the project of Garay and embodied and ex- 
tended the apparatus of Porta — it may be asked who was ] And although 
none of his machines are extant, nor any of his immediate successors have 
had the candor to acknowledge their obligations to him, it is not less the 
duty of historians to uphold his claims until evidence shall be adduced to 
establish those of another — until some older and clearer fountain than 
his Century of Inventions shall be discovered — from which streams 
equally unacknowledged have been drawn. We cannot but hope that 
the obloquy and uncertainty under which his name is yet shrouded will 
eventually be dispersed, when he will be esteemed one of the most re- 
markable mechanicians of modern times, and be associated with the Da3- 
daluses and Archytases of antiquity. 

How similar to Worcester's manner of announcing his discoveries, is 
the following one from Grlauber, an older writer ! It appears, at the first 
glance, as absurd as any thing in the Century. " A certain secret by the 
help whereof wines are easily transported from mountainous places, re- 
mote from rivers and destitute of other conveniences of carriage, so that 
the carrying of ten vessels is of cheaper price than, othervrise, the carrying 
of one." This passage, he observes, offended many both learned and un- 
learned, who " believed the thing impossible, and nothing but dreams and 
fancies." He was so much quizzed about it as to regret having mentioned 
it <4 Many judge this thing incredible because of the want of winged ca?ts, 
that need not horses ! confirming one the other in unbeliefe, leading one 
another after the manner of the blind." His plan was to take the juice of 
the grape before fermentation commenced, and concentrate it by boiling 
till it became of " the consistence of honey." The water being thus eva- 
porated reduced the wine to less than one tenth of its former bulk and 
weight, while it still retained the strength and virtue of the whole ; for 
" new wine decocted and inspissated before its fermentation loseth nothing 
of its virtues :" hence it could be transported at one tenth the expense. 
When used, it was to be diluted with the same quantity of water as was 
evaporated from it. (Treatise on Philos. Furnaces : Lond. 1651, p. 353.) 






Chap. 7.] Anecdote of Cromwell. 441 

The adoption of some mode of concentrating wines as abtve, would 
produce an immense saving in their freight and carriage over the globe, 
and would consequently greatly reduce their cost. It would also defeat 
the enormous frauds that are practiced in the manufacture of artificial 
wines — mixtures in which not a drop of the juice of the grape is said to 
enter. Glauber says, " the new wine is not to be inspissated in caul- 
drons," on account of the taste which it would contract from the metal. 



CHAPTER VII. 



Hautefeuille, Huyghens and Hooke — Moreland — His table of cylinders — His pumps worked by a 
cylindrical high-pressure steam-engine — He made no claim to a steam-engine in England — Simple de- 
vice by which he probably worked his plunger pumps — Inventions of his at Vauxhall — Anecdote of him 
from Evelyn's Diary — Early steam projectors courtiers — Ridiculous origin of some honors — Edict of 
Nantes — Papin — Digesters — Safety valve — Papin's plan to transmit power through pipes by means of 
air — Cause of its failure — Another plan by compressed air — Papin's experiments to move a piston by 
gunpowder and by steam — The latter abandoned by him — The safety valve improved, not invented by 
Papin — Mercurial safety valves — Water lute — Steam machine of Papin for raising water and imparting 
motion to machinery. 

Towards the latter part of Worcester's life, a young Frenchman was 
fast rising into notice. This was John Hautefeuille, the son of a baker at 
Orleans, and one of the most brilliant mechanicians of the age. He was 
in his twentieth year when Worcester died. The device for regulating 
the vibration of the balance in watches by a spring, whence arose the 
name of pendulum watches, was invented by him, and was subsequently 
improved by Huyghens. Hautefeuille entered the church and became 
an abbe. He wrote several tracts on subjects connected with mechanics. 
In 1678 he proposed steam as a source of power, and applied it to give 
motion to a piston. Instead of aqueous vapor he also proposed the alter- 
nate evolution and condensation of the vapor of alcohol, in such a manner 
that none should be wasted ; and both he and Huyghens gave motion to 
pistons, by exploding small charges of gunpowder in cylinders. In 
1678, Dr. Hooke proposed a steam-engine on the atmospheric principle, 
but the only information respecting it is in a memorandum to that effect 
found among the papers of Dr. Robison, the author of the treatise on Me- 
chanical Philosophy. 

These examples of imparting motion to a piston by aeriform fluids are 
interesting, inasmuch as they show that the device was not very novel in 
the middle of the 17th century, and that mechanics in different countries 
were familiar with it. 

We must now refer to another member of the English court, a contem- 
porary of Worcester, and like him actively engaged in the politics of the 
times, but who on the other hand adhered to the commonwealth until the 
latter part of Cromwell's administration. We are told that one evening, 
near midnight, an interview took place between Cromwell and Thurloe 

56 



442 Moreland 9 s [Book IV 

his secretary, at the house of the latter, on some state business that required 
the utmost secrecy. It was not till the matter had been opened that the 
Protector became aware of a third person being in the room, when he is 
said to have drawn his dagger, and would have dispatched the supposed 
intruder, had not Thurloe guaranteed silence on the part of his sleeping 
attendant. This was Samuel Moreland, the inventor of the plunger pump. 
He was then employed by and in the confidence of the secretary, and was 
asleep, or affected to be so, during the interview. On this or some other 
occasion, he overheard the discussion of a plan to take off the exiled king; 
to whom he disclosed the whole, and was rewarded with a title at the 
restoration. 

It is not known when Moreland first turned his attention to mechanics : 
probably not till the restoration. As a favorite of Charles II, and a groom 
of the privy chamber, he must often have met Worcester at court ; while 
from their congenial habits and pursuits as mechanicians, they were most 
likely on familiar terms with each other. As master of mechanics to the 
king, Moreland was no doubt one of those who visited and examined the 
machine erected by Worcester at Vauxhall, and as a matter of course he 
often perused the Century of Inventions. He has not however had the 
ingenuousness to mention any of these things ; but notwithstanding this, we 
cannot believe so far as his applications of steam are concerned, that he was 
not indebted either to the machine itself, to the Century, or to personal in- 
tercourse with Worcester, and probably to them all. The first invention of 
Moreland that we hear of is the pump that he patented in 1675, and on which, 
according to one writer, he had previously spent twelve years. This carries 
the date back to about 1663, the year in which the Century was published. 
It is not at all unlikely that this famous pamphlet first induced Moreland 
(as well as many others) to turn his attention to mechanical discoveries, 
and furnished him with materials to work upon. In the manuscript volume 
presented by him to the French king in 1683, (see page 273) and now 
preserved in the British museum, there is a very short chapter on fire or 
steam engines, of which the following is a translation : — 

<l The Principles of the new Force of Fire, invented by the Chevalier More- 
land, in the year 1682, and presented to his most Christian Majesty, 1683. 

" Water b^ing evaporated by the force of fire, these vapors immediately 
require a greater space (about two thousand times) than the water occu- 
pied before, and too forcible to be always imprisoned, will burst a piece 
of cannon. But being governed according to the rules of statics, and re- 
duced by science to measure, weight and balance, then they will peace- 
ably carry their burden, (like good horses) and thus become of great use 
to mankind ; particularly to raise water according to the following table, 
which shows the number of pounds which can be raised 1800 times per 
hour to six inches in height, by cylinders half filled with water, as well 
as the different diameters and depths of those cylinders : — 







CYLINDERS. 










Pounds weight to be 


•iametcr in 


Feet. 




Length in 


Feet. 






raised. 


1 


- 


- 


- 2 


- 


. 


- 


- 15 


2 


- 


. 


- 4 


- 


- 


- 


- 120 


3 


- 


. 


- 6 


- 


.. 


- 


- 405 


4 


. 


. 


- 8 


- 


- 


- 


- 960 


5 


. 


. 


- 10 


- 


- 


- 


- 1875 


6 


- 


- 


- 12 


- 


- 


- 


- 3240 



Chap. 7.] Tables of Cylinders. 443 

Number of Cylinders, having a diameter required to raise the following numbers of 

of 6 feet and a length of 12 feet, pounds weight of water. 

1 3,240 

2 6,480 

3 9,720 

4 12,960 

5 16,200 

6 19,440 

7 22,680 

8 25,920 

9 - 29,160 

10 32,400 

20 64,800 

30 97,200 

40 129,600 

50 162,000 

30 194,400 

70 226,800 

80 259,200 

90 291,600" 

As this is all that Moreland has left on the subject, it is difficult if not 
impossible to ascertain the precise construction of his apparatus. He is 
as silent respecting the manner and details by which the object was ac- 
complished as Worcester himself, and hence the steam-engine of one is 
quite as much a riddle as that of the other. Were these "cylinders" 
generators of steam — boilers ] or were they separate vessels for the re- 
ception of water, and from which it was expelled by the vapor, as from 
the receivers of Savery 1 or, working cylinders, whose pistons were moved 
by the expansive force of steam 1 or, lastly, were they pump chambers, 
by which the liquid was raised % We suppose they were the last. Had 
they acted on the principle of Savery's receivers, they could never have 
been filled and discharged thirty times a minute, or 1800 times an hour. 
Then as Moreland speaks only of high steam, it can hardly be imagined 
that he used or thought of using its expansive force to move pistons in the 
largest cylinders he has named, or made calculations for the employment 
of ninety of them. Where could he have got a boiler sufficiently strong 
and capacious to supply a cylinder twelve feet long and six in diameter, 
to say nothing of the difficulty of making such cylinders % Yet he speaks 
of them as nothing extraordinary. Now there was no difficulty in making 
them of all the dimensions namedjfor Ms plunger pumps, (see No. 123 of 
our illustrations) for the simple reason that they were not required to be 
bored ; as the piston or plunger worked in contact only with the collar of 
leathers or stuffing box at the top. That it is to these he refers appears 
also from the terms, " reduced by science to measure, weight and balance," 
these being the very same that he used when he claimed, by the invention 
of this pump, to have " reduced the raising of water to weight and mea- 
sure" viz. by comparing the weight of the loaded plunger to the quantity 
of water displaced from the cylinder by its descent, (see page 273) — and 
thence the number of pounds raised by each cylinder in the preceding 
table, would be the sum of the weights on each plunger. The term "six 
inches" probably arose from that being the length of stroke of his experi- 
mental plunger ; the length of the other cylinders and their effects being 
calculated from it. The cylinders being only " half filled with water," 
would then refer to that quantity, or about that, being expelled at each 



444 Moreland's Steam-Engine. [Book IV. 

stroke, because the plungers would occupy one half only of the interior 
capacities of the cylinders. See the figure of one on page 272. 

If this view of Moreland's project be correct, then he merely used 
steam to work his plunger pump ; and therefore could not justly claim in 
1682 to have invented, but only to have applied, the " force of fire." 
That he employed a simple form of a high-pressure engine, in other words 
moved a piston by the elasticity of the vapor, like Hautefeuille and Wor- 
cester, we have little doubt. His language intimates that steam was then 
rendered so manageable as to be applicable to numerous operations " for 
the benefit of mankind," of which the raising of water was the only one 
under his consideration. He obviously was in possession of the means 
of imparting motion to solids by steam, and thus making it peaceably 
to carry burdens, or overcome resistances, " like good horses :" — In- 
deed, one might almost suppose from his apparent carelessness in not 
mentioning the mode in which the steam was applied, viz. in giving 
motion to a piston, that explanation on this point was then no longer 
necessary. 

It is singular that Moreland made no claim for this invention in England. 
"Why was this, if he had any 1 Does it not imply that he did not invent 
the steam part of the apparatus 1 — else why not have patented it as well 
as the pump \ for the object deserved it, and the prospects of remunera- 
tion were as promising at home as in France. The fact is, he could not 
claim the piston steam-engine where the labors of Worcester and others 
were still in remembrance, and where some of their machines were pro- 
bably extant. As an educated man and an enlightened mechanic, More 
land was not ignorant of the labors of Ramseye, Fludd, Hautefeuille and 
Worcester. It is pretty clear that he lit his candle at the lamps of these 
men, and particularly the latter ; for in the short chapter on steam quoted 
above, he has copied both the ideas and the language of the author of the 
Century of Inventions. One observation is highly creditable to him, if he 
was the author of the experiments from which it was deduced, viz. the 
relative volume of steam and water. A quantity of the latter when con- 
verted into the former occupies, he observes, 2000 times its former space : 
modern experiments make it between 1800 and 1900 times. 

Of several simple modes by which Moreland may have applied steam 
to work his pumps, we shall mention one : — Let a small steam-cylinder, 
open at the top, be placed under the same end of a vibrating beam as the 
plunger of the pump ; the piston rods of both cylinders being connected 
to the beam : then, by turning a three-way steam-cock, the vapor would 
rush into the bottom of the steam-cylinder, and pushing up the piston, 
would raise the beam and the loaded plunger of the pump ; and by then 
turning the cock so as to close the communication between the cylinder 
and the boiler, and to open one between the former and the external air, 
the steam would escape, and the weights on the plunger would cause it, 
with the beam and steam-piston, to descend. By turning the steam-cock 
as before, the stroke would be repeated. The only objection to such a 
device is, that it is too crude to be attributed to Moreland ; for, from the 
advantages he possessed in knowing all that had been previously done, 
there can be little doubt that he was in possession of a self-acting engine, 
and of the knowledge of increasing its energy according to the different 
sized pumps required to be worked by it. 

Moreland possessed a natural turn for mechanics, and during the latter 
half of his life devoted himself almost exclusively to the invention and 
improvement of useful machinery. Were a description of his and Wor- 
cester's workshops now extant, it would possess more real interest than 



Chap. 7.] English Steam Machinists Courtiers. 445 

any thing which history or tradition has handed down about round-heads 
and cavaliers. He had a place fitted up at the expense of government, 
with the requisite apparatus for carrying on his researches, at which 
Charles sometimes assisted ; and he speaks of having moreover expended 
large sums of his own in experiments, to please the king's fancy. Of the 
number of curious things here contrived, besides his speaking-trumpet, 
capstan, pumps and steam-engines, we may judge from what is reported 
of his dwelling house at Vauxhall, every part of which exhibited proofs 
of his inventive mind ; even the side table in his dining room was supplied 
with a large fountain, and the glasses stood under little streams of water. 
His coach too contained a portable kitchen with clock-work machinery, 
by which he could make soup, broil steaks, or roast a joint of meat. 

Vauxhall gardens, as a place of public resort, appear to have originated 
in the curious things constructed there by Moreland. Aubrey, in his His- 
tory of Surrey, states that in 1667, Sir Samuel "built a fine room at 
Vauxhall, the inside all of looking-glass, and fountains very pleasant to 
behold, which is much visited by strangers. It stands in the middle of 
the garden, covered with Cornish slate, on the point whereof he placed a 
punchinello very well carved, which held a dial; but the winds have de- 
molished it." " The house [observes Sir John Hawkins] seems to have 
been rebuilt since the time that Sir Samuel Moreland dwelt in it ; and 
there being a large garden belonging to it planted with a great number 
of stately trees, and laid out in shady walks, it obtained the name of Spring 
Gardens, and the house being converted into a tavern or place of enter- 
tainment, it was frequented by the votaries of pleasure." 

Moreland's attachment to mechanics continued unabated in his old age, 
and even after his sight was lost. A pleasing proof of this is given in the 
diary of the celebrated John Evelyn. " October 25, 1695. The arch- 
bishop and myselfe went to Hammersmith to visite Sir Sam. Moreland, 
who was entirely blind ; a very mortifying sight. He shewed us his in- 
vention of writing, which was very ingenious, also his wooden kalender 
which instructed him all by feeling, and other pretty and useful inventions 
of mills, pumps &c. and the pump he had erected that serves water to his 
garden, and to passengers, with an inscription, and brings, from a filthy part 
of the Thames neere it, a most perfect and pure water. He had newly 
buried c£200 worth of music books, six feet under ground, being, as 
he said, love songs and vanity. He plays himselfe psalms and religious 
hymns on the Theobo." 

It is singular that almost all the early English steam machinists and 
supposed experimenters were courtiers. Bacon was Lord Chancellor; 
Ramseye, groom of the privy chamber to Charles I ; Worcester, a mar- 
quis and a general ; Moreland, a knight, and groom of the privy or bed 
chamber* to Charles II ; and Bushell and Savery held offices under the 
government. 

a It is a natural inquiry, what odd duties were attached to such an office, that gentlemen 
should desire to perform them? and particularly to such beasts as Charles II or George 
IV? An analysis of the honors which monarchs bestow, would afford amusement and 
instruction to American readers. It would add to the causes of honest exultation in the 
founders of our republic, for their excluding such fooleries from our shores. Our ex- 
ample in this respect as well as in others, is destined by Providence to exert a salutary 
influence on the world. A spirit of enquiry, and ideas of self respect, are already be- 
coming too prevalent for men to be kept much longer in a mere state of pupilage, to be 
governed like children through the medium of their senses, with pageants and high 
sounding titles, costumes and ceremonies, tinsel and gewgaws. Those persons who 
have not reflected on the subject, have need of a large share of faith to believe one half 
the circumstances connected with the origin and the conferring of titles, so truly pre 



446 Papin. [Book IV 

The next experiments on steam of which we have any account were 
made by a Frenchman, but not in France. The reason of this may as 
well be noticed, since it will serve to show how great the blessings are 
which we enjoy over the people of the old world. Of all the different 
species of tyranny under which Europe has groaned and still groans, that 
by which the inhabitants are compelled to adopt such articles of religious 
faith as their governors choose to give them, is the most diabolical. This 
may be considered as the climax of human degradation, and of human 
oppression. No feeling mind can contemplate without horror the acts of 
those despots who, not content with consuming the substance and tyran- 
nizing over the bodies of their subjects, as they call them, insist on sub- 
duing their minds and consciences also ! — despots who, though covered 
with crime, blasphemously set themselves up as " Heads of the Church r* 
and " Defenders of the Faith !" and this too by the " grace of God !" — 
And these Heads of the Church, in order to defend " the Faith," have 
harassed, plundered, hanged, shot and even burnt alive both men and wo- 
men who would not acknowledge them as such ! Thus it was when the 
edict of Nantes, which Henry IV established to protect his Protestant 
subjects in their civil and religious rights, was revoked by Louis XIV, it 
became the signal for the most violent persecutions of that people. Their 
children were taken from them and placed under Papist teachers — they 
were compelled by the penalty of military execution to embrace the Ro- 
man faith — a price was set on the heads of those who refused — a twentieth 
part of their whole number was butchered — half a million fled into other 
lands (as the Pilgrims did to this) that they might be at liberty to worship 
God according to their own consciences. In this way the most ingenious 
and avowedly the most industrious mechanics of France were driven 
into exile ; and by a righteous and retributive Providence, the staple ma- 
nufactures of that kingdom were transferred to other nations. 

Of those who took refuge in England was Papin, a native of Blois ; a 
physician and philosopher, and one of the most talented of the early ex- 
perimenters on steam and air : a man of whom any country might have 
been proud, and who, though France then cast out as a disgrace, she 
now claims honor to herself for having given him birth; and mourns that 
the records of his labors are only to be found in foreign archives. What 
a commentary on religious persecution, that the only claims which Roman 
Catholic France has or can set up for a share in the invention of the 
steam-engine, are based on the ingenuity of a Jew and a Protestant! — on 
Solomon Decaus and Denys Papin. 

Through the influence of the celebrated Boyle, Papin was elected a 
fellow of the British Royal Society in December, 16S0. He was an ac- 
tive and useful member, and contributed several interesting papers to the 
Society's Transactions. In 1681 he invented a method of softening bones, 
with a view to extract nourishing food from them, viz. by submitting them 
to the action of steam at high temperatures, in close vessels named digesters. 

posterous are they. The Orders were derived from all sorts of things, as the moon, 
stars, dogs, horses, swords, flowers, stones, shells, birds, pigs, the Savior, angels, saints, 
women — and there was even an order of fools ! — elephants, thistles, mountains, blood, 
wool, a table — and who does not know that " the most honorable " of English Orders at 
the present day are those of the bathing tub, or bath! and of the garter! The ceremo- 
nies attending these can only be equalled for mummeries and childish puerilities by the 
old interludes, as those of " The Bishop of Fools" and " The Abbot of Unreason." 
Such are the things that distinguish " the privileged orders" of Europe — that are 
deemed necessary to maintain " the dignity of the crown," — and the debasement of the 
people. 



Chap. 7.] Digesters and Safety- Valves. 447 

There seems however to be some mistake respecting the date just men- 
tioned, which is the one generally assigned; for in the second volume of 
Boyle's Works (by Shaw, Lon. 1725) are details of experiments on boiling 
beef &c. " in screw'd vessels or digestors," in the beginning of the year 
1679 — thus : " January 29. Eight days ago I fill'd a screw'd vessel with 
beef and water together, and when it had continued over a moderate lire 
for 8 or 9 hours in balneo maria [a water bath] stopp'd also with a screw, 
I took the flesh out," &c. " Feb. 10. I boil'd a cow heel after the same 
manner as I had done the flesh above mention'd, but left it for four hours 
or more upon a moderate fire ; then the vessels being unstopp'd, we found 
the flesh exceedingly well boiled, and the bones so soft that they might be 
easily cut with a knife and eaten." " Feb. 12. I repeated the experiment 
and let the vessel remain exposed to the fire for 12 hours," &c. - - - - - 
" Hence it appears that many bones and hard tendons, which we daily 
throw away as unprofitable, may, by the help of a balneo mariai stopp'd 
with a screw, be converted into good nourishment." pp 550, 551. 

Papin's first digesters were as liable to be rent asunder as eolipiles 
placed on a fire with their orifices stopped. They are figured in detail in 
Poliniere's Experiences de Physique, 2d ed. Paris 1718. Each consisted 
of a short but very thick tube, of bell-metal, about a foot in length and 
five inches in diameter, with one end closed. The open end had a collar 
cast on it, to which the cap or cover was secured by clamps and a screw. 
The cover and end of the tube were ground together so as to fit air-tight, 
like a valve to its seat. A few bones and a little water were put in, and 
the cover screwed down ; the vessel was then laid in a horizontal position 
on a bed of charcoal in a long iron grate. The almost unavoidable rup- 
ture of these vessels, led Papin to the invention of the lever safety-valve, 
which he first applied to them, and afterwards to machines for raising 
water by steam. 

Notwithstanding the practical knowledge of the properties of steam 
acquired by the employment of digesters, Papin does not appear to have 
had any idea of using it as a mechanical agent till some years after. His 
first paper on the subject of raising water is dated July, 1685, (Phil. Trans, 
vol. xv, page 1093 ; Abridgment, vol. i, page 539) entitled " A New Way 
of Raising Water, enigmatically proposed." Three different solutions 
wore sent in, after which he explained. The device was a small fountain, 
in which the liquid was raised by a piston bellows " put in some secret 
place, where a body may play the same." The application of the device 
was then pointed out, viz. to draw water from mines, by means of a run- 
ning stream located " far distant " from them : in other words, to transmit 
power to a considerable distance by means of air. 

His plan was this : a series of air-tight receivers were to be placed, 12 
feet above each other, in the shaft ; the highest on a level with the ground, 
and the lowest 12 feet above the bottom of the pit. The water was to be 
transferred by the pressure of the atmosphere from one receiver to ano- 
ther, till it was discharged above. For this purpose a pipe extended from 
the water to the bottom of the lowest vessel ; another pipe from the lower 
part of this to the next one, and so on to the top ; and to prevent the water 
from running back, the upper orifice of each pipe was covered by a valve. 
The mode by which he alternately withdrew air from and admitted it into 
the receivers, constitutes the main feature of the plan. The upper parts 
of every two receivers were connected by branch pipes to a long one at- 
tached to the bottom of a separate air-pump, which was to be placed near a 
water-wheel impelled by the current ; and the piston was to be worked by 
a crank formed on the shaft of the wheel. The operation of two pumps 



448 Papin's Air Machines. [Book IV 

and four receivers will be sufficient for the purpose of illustration. The 
pump cylinders were open at the top. They had no valves, and but one 
small opening at the bottom of each where the long air-pipe was united ; 
and the capacity of each cylinder was equal to that of two receivers. The 
cranks were so arranged that as one piston ascended the other descended. 
It was not two adjoining receivers that were connected to the same pump, 
but the lowest and the next but one above it, i. e. Nos. 1 and 3, while to 
Nos. 2 and 4 the pipe of the other pump was attached. Then as the 
piston of the first mentioned pump was raised, the air in Nos. 1 and 3 
would be rarefied by rushing into the pump cylinder, and water would be 
forced into them by the atmosphere : in the mean time the other piston 
would produce a partial vacuum in Nos. 2 and 4, and they would become 
filled with the liquid contents of Nos. 1 and 3, in consequence of the air 
previously in these being driven back by the descent of the piston ; so 
that as the wheel revolved, water would constantly be entering one half 
of the receivers, and the contents of the other half be discharging. How 
the water was to be delivered from the highest receiver Papin has not 
informed us — probably through an orifice covered by a valve opening 
outwards. 

This project was ingenious, but of no practical value ; and it failed even 
in an experiment. In consequence of the extreme elasticity of air, and 
the great facility with which it dilates and is compressed, little or no effect 
was produced by the action of the pumps. When a piston descended, the 
air in the long pipe readily yielded to its impulse without imparting any 
very sensible compression in the receivers ; and on the piston's ascent, the 
air in the pipe again dilated and no sufficient rarefaction took place, in 
consequence of the great distance of the receiver from the exhausting 
apparatus. 

On the failure of this he devised another plan. Suppose, for example, 
that it was required to raise water out of amine, and that there was no 
river to turn a wheel to work the pumps nearer than a mile. Papin pro- 
posed to place two air-pump cylinders fitted with pistons near the water- 
wheel, and other two at the mouth of the mine. These were to be con- 
nected by a pipe. The action of the pistons moved by the wheel was to 
compress the air in the cylinders, and in the pipe throughout its whole 
length, under the idea that when the pistons at one end of the pipe were 
depressed, those at the other would, by the communication of pressure, 
be elevated ; but although the pistons moved by the water-wheel con- 
densed the air, those at the mine stood still. The same cause that led 
Papin to abandon the first device, also rendered this one useless. If air 
were incompressible, the plan would have answered : had he employed 
water instead of air, the machine would have performed. Nothing daunted 
however, he tried again in 16S6, and with a somewhat similar apparatus, 
but one whose action depended upon the rarefaction of air. Two large 
air cylinders, open at top, were placed a short distance apart at the mouth 
of the mine, and directly over them a cylindrical shaft or axle, supported 
on journals at each end. Instead of rods being attached to the pistons, a 
strong rope was fastened to the centre of each, and coiled three or four 
times round the axle in opposite directions, and fastened to it. Between 
the cylinders a large drum or wheel was fixed upon the axle, having a 
long rope wound round it, and the two ends (of the rope) suspended from 
opposite sides reached half way down the mine. To these ends two large 
buckets were attached, in which to raise the water. As the drum turned 
first one way and then the other, one bucket would be raised and the other 
lowered, like two buckets suspended over a pulley in a well. The design 



Chap. 7.] Air Machine — Four-way Cock. 449 

of the air cylinders was therefore to impart an alternate movement to the 
axle and drum, and consequently to the buckets, by the descent of the 
pistons. (The power that forced these down was the pressure of the at- 
mosphere, and the manner of exciting it will presently be noticed.) Hence 
as one piston descended, the rope secured to it necessarily drew round 
the axle, and raised the other; and when this one in its turn was forced 
down, the movement was reversed and the first one raised. 

A communication was made between the under side of the two cylinders 
by a pipe, and to this another long one was attached at right angles. This 
last pipe was to be of such a length as to reach to the place where an 
under or overshot wheel could be applied to work two air-pumps. These 
were to be furnished with valves and suckers like common sucking pumps, 
and to the lower part of each the exhausting pipe was to be connected by 
a branch. These pumps would therefore draw the air out of the cylinders 
at the mine, and consequently cause the pistons in them to descend. For 
this purpose, however, some device for alternately opening and closing 
the communication of each cylinder with the exhausting pipe was required ; 
because if a vacuum were made in both cylinders at the same time, the 
pressure of the atmosphere on both pistons would be the same, and neither 
of them would move. To avoid this, Papin introduced at the intersection 
of the exhausting pipe with the one that connected the cylinders, a four- 
way cock — three of its passages being joined to the three branches formed 
by the intersection of the pipes, while the fourth one opened to the air. 
Thus, supposing the pumps to be constantly at work, and the plug of the 
cock so turned that the air in one cylinder at the mine might be drawn 
out, the atmosphere would then push down the piston, provided the ex- 
ternal air had access to the under side of the other piston. This was that 
which the fourth passage of the cock was designed to accomplish ; for 
whenever one cylinder was in communication with the exhausting pipe the 
other was in communication with this passage, and hence by turning the 
cock a constant reciprocating motion was imparted to the axle, drum and 
buckets. 

A project something like this, Papin thought, might be applied to work 
the pumps of the great machine at Marli, (see page 296) — the power of 
the water-wheels on the Seine being transmitted by air instead of chains 
&c. The device is creditable to his ingenuity, but he was doomed to 
experience further disappointment ; for, on trial, the air was so slowly 
drawn from the cylinders, and the difficulties of making the pistons work 
air-tight were so great, that no practical benefit could be derived by its 
adoption. He enlarged his pumps and diminished the bore of the pipes 
in order to accelerate the movement of the pistons, but without success. 
Had he placed a close vessel, several times larger than his cylinders, in 
communication with the farther end of the exhausting pipe, and in which 
a constant vacuum was maintained, then, on turning the cock, the air in 
the cylinder would have rushed into this vessel, and the piston would im- 
mediately begin to descend. This mode of transmitting power is capable 
of some useful applications. See an account of a proposed pneumatic 
rail-way in the current journals of the day. 

Although these attempts to raise water and transmit power by means 
of air were unsuccessful, they are interesting for the ingenuity displayed, 
and also because their failure led Papin to the employment of other agents. 
Having been invited by the Landgrave of Hesse to accept the professor- 
ship of mathematics in the university of Marpurg, in Germany, he left 
England in 1687 ; but shortly before his departure, he exhibited to the 
Royal Society some experiments on the application of gunpowder to pro- 

57 



450 Pajrin's Experiments on Steam [Book IV. 

duee a vacuum. His apparatus consisted of a small cylinder, in which a 
piston like that of a common pump-sucker (viz. with an aperture covered 
by a valve) was fitted to move. The bottom of the cylinder was closed, 
and when the piston was near the top he exploded a small charge of 
powder below it, with the hope that the sudden blast of flame would expel 
all the air through the valve, which instantly closing would prevent its 
return. A vacuum being thus formed, the pressure of the atmosphere 
would be excited and might be used as a source of power. He could 
not however succeed in driving out all the air by the explosion, and 
the pressure on the piston, (ascertained by attaching weights to a rope 
passed over a pulley and connected to the piston rod) instead of being 
13 or 14 pounds on the square inch, seldom exceeded six or seven. He 
published an account of these experiments the following year in the Acta 
Eruditorum, a journal published at Leipsic, and which was to Germany what 
the Journal des Savans was to France and the Philosophical Transactions 
to England. It was commenced in 1682, and both the latter in 1665. 

In 1690, Papin, unable to obtain a sufficient vacuum with gunpowder, 
turned his attention to steam. In one of his first essays he raised the 
piston by its expansive force ; and then allowing it time to cool and return 
to its former bulk as a liquid, the pressure of the air forced the piston back. 
His cylinder was 2J inches diameter, and closed at the bottom. A small 
quantity of water was introduced through a hole in the piston, which was 
pushed down to exclude the air below it, and the hole then stopped by a 
plug. A brasier of burning coals was now applied to the bottom of the 
cylinder, and the piston consequently raised by the accumulating vapor. 
When the piston reached nearly to the top of the cylinder, it was retained 
there by a latch slipped into a notch in the piston rod : the fire was now 
removed, and the steam quickly condensed by the lower temperature of 
the surrounding air : the latch was removed, and the atmosphere pressed 
the piston down and raised a load of 60 pounds, which was attached by a 
rope and pulley to the piston rod, being an effective force of 12 J pounds 
upon every square inch on the upper surface of the piston* A device of 
this kind Papin thought was applicable to draw water from mines, and to 
row boats against wind and tide. 

It does not appear that Papin made any essential improvement on the 
apparatus during the four following years ; for when he published his 
" Recueil des diverse Pieces touchant quelques Nouvelles Machines, et 
autres Sujets Philosophiques, par M. D. Papin, Dr. en Med. A Casel, 1695," 
he still contemplated generating the steam in the cylinders ; and at every 
stroke these were either moved from the fire, or the fire from them. It is 
astonishing that the idea of a fixed and separate boiler did not occur to him. 
His plan was never tried except as an experiment ; and he subsequently 
abandoned the use of cylinders and pistons, and applied steam to raise 
water on the plan of Worcester's 6Sth proposition. This was unfortunate 
for his fame ; for in his experiments with the piston and cylinder he was 
in possession of every principle of the low-pressure steam-engine, and had 
he followed up the device he would have borne off the palm from all his 
contemporaries. Even the high-pressure engine, and all the glory of its 
development, was then within his reach ; but he was no practical me- 
chanic, and his thoughts became diverted into other channels. One of the 

a It is impossible to contemplate the various attempts of Papin to move a piston by 
atmospheric pressure, without noticing the analogy between his contrivances and that of 
Guerricke, and without thinking that the apparatus of this philosopher was present 
to his mind. 



Chap. 7.] Water Lute — Safety Valves. 45] 

most pleasing and honorable circumstances connected with the history of 
Papin's labors, is the candid admission of several English writers of his 
great merits, and their generously expressing regret that his attention 
should have been diverged when he was so near realizing the most splen- 
did reward. His name is however inseparably connected with the steam- 
engine, and as long as the safety-valve shall be used the world will be his 
debtor. 

It should not however be supposed that safety-valves were wholly un- 
known before Papin's t : me ; on the contrary, they were frequently used, 
although this fact has not been noticed by any writer on the steam- 
engine. The liability of stills and retorts to be rent asunder led old che- 
mists to apply plugs to openings in those vessels, that the vapor might 
raise or drive them out and escape ere its tension exceeded the strength 
of the vessels : such were the plugs in ancient steam deities, see page 399. 
In some old works on distilling, conical plugs or valves are shown as fitted 
into cavities on the tops of boilers, and in some cases they were loaded. 
In the " Maison Rustigue de Maistres Charles Estienne et Jean Liebault, 
Docteurs en Medecine," Paris, 1574, folio 196, 197, are figures of two 
close boilers in which the distilling vessels were heated : one formed a 
water, the other a vapor bath. On the top of each is a conical valve open- 
ing upwards. These served both to let out the superfluous steam and to 
introduce water. Glauber, who contributed several valuable additions to 
the mechanical department of chemistry, has figured and described, in his 
Treatise on Philosophical Furnaces, the modes by which he prevented 
glass retorts or stills from being burst by the vapor. A long stopple or 
conical valve was fitted to the neck of each, being ground air-tight to its 
seat, and loaded with a " cap of lead," so that when the steam became too 
" high " it slightly raised the valve and a portion escaped ; the valve then 
closed again of itself, " being pressed down with the leaden cap and so 
stopt close." (English Translation, Lond. 1651, p. 306.) The valve on 
Newcomen's first engine was of this description. In the same work Glau- 
ber describes the most philosophical of all safety-valves, viz. a column of 
mercury enclosed in a bent tube which communicates with the boiler or 
still, somewhat like the modern mercurial gauge. He also describes that 
beautiful modification of it known among chemists as the water lute, or 
quicksilver lute : that is, around the mouth or neck of a vessel a deep 
cavity is formed and partly filled with water or mercury, as the case may 
be. A cylindrical vessel, open at top and closed at bottom, forms the 
cover: it is inverted, the open end being placed in the cavity and dipping 
as far into the liquid as the internal pressure may require. In " The Art 
of Distillation, or a Treatise of the choisest Spagyrical Experiments," &:c. 
by John French, Doctor of Physic, Lond. 1651, the author describes the 
same devices for preventing the explosion of vessels as those mentioned 
by Glauber. Speaking of the action of such safety-valves he observes, 
(page 7) " upon the top of a stopple [valve] there may be fastened some 
lead, that if the spirit be too strong, it will only heave up the stopple and 
let it fall down again." Papin's claim therefore is not to the valve itself, 
but to its improvement, or rather to the mode of applying it by means of 
a lever and moveable weight ; thereby not only preventing the valve from 
being blown entirely out of its place, but regulating the pressure at will, 
and rendering the device of universal application. 

It was not till some years after Savery had introduced his steam machine 
that Papin proposed the following one, which he announced in a work 
entitled " Nouvelle maniere pour lever l'eau par la force du feu, mise en 
lumiere, par M D. Papin, Docteur en Med. Prof, en Mathem. a Casel, 



452 



Steam Machine by Papin. 



[Book IV 



1707." It is inserted here out of chronological order, to keen this notice 
of his labors unbroken. 




No. 192. Papin. A. D. 1707. 

A copper boiler, A, is set in brick work and furnished with a safety- 
valve, B, whose lever is loaded with the weight C. The steam pipe and 
cock D connect the boiler with the receiving cylinder F. A hollow float 
or piston is made to move easily in F, to prevent the steam from coming 
in contact with the water. A cavity is made in this float for the reception 
of an iron heater, Z, designed to keep up the temperature of the steam 
when the latter is admitted into F. The heater is admitted through the 
opening on the top of F, which is closed by the valve G. X, a funnel 
through which the water to be raised is introduced, which is kept from re- 
turning by closing the cock or valve H. The lower part of F is connected 
with the rising main K by a curved and tapered tube. The pipe K ter- 
minates in a reservoir or air chamber, whence the water is discharged by 
the pipe O upon an overshot wheel, or conveyed to the place where it may 
be required. If the receiver be charged from below, a suction pipe (im- 
perfectly represented by the pipe I) was continued to it from the under 
side of the curved pipe. The steam flowing through the pipe D presses 
down the piston, and the water beneath it is forced up the pipe K, (the 
valve at the lower part of K preventing its return.) When the piston has 
reached the bottom of F, the cock D is shut and the one marked E is 
opened. H is then opened, and the water rushes in and drives up the 
piston as before, when the operation is repeated. Water was raised by 
one of these machines to an elevation of 70 feet, whence it descended and 
formed a jet d'eau in the court of the Hessian Academy of Arts. 

Belidor inserted a figure and description of this machine in the second 
volume of his Architecture Hydraulique, p. 328. 



Chap. 8.] Thomas Savery. 453 



CHAP TER VIII. 



Experimenters contemporary with Papin — Savery — This engineer publishes his inventions — His 
project for propelling vessels — Ridicules the Surveyor of the Navy for opposing it — His first experiments 
on steam made in a tavern — Account of them by Desaguliers and Switzer — Savery's first engine — Its 
operation — Engine with a single receiver — Savory's improved engine described — Gauge cocks — Excel- 
lent features of his improved engine — Its various parts connected by coupling screws — Had no safety- 
valve — Rejected by miners on account of the danger from the boilers exploding — Solder melted by 
steam — Opinions respecting the origin of Savery's engine — It bears no relation to the piston engine 
— Modifications of Savery's engine by Desaguliers, Leopold, Blakey and others — Rivatz — Engines by 
Gensanne — De Moura — De Rigny — Francois and others — Amonton's fire mill — Newcomen and Cawley — 
Their engine superior to Savery's — Newcomen acquainted with the previous experiments of Papin — 
Circumstances favorable to the introduction of Newcomen's engine — Description of it— Condensation by 
injection discovered by chance — Chains and Sectors — Savery's claim to a share in Newcomen's patent an 
unjust one — Merits of Newcomen and Cawley. 

Both philosophers and mechanics were engaged in experiments on air 
and steam machines about the same time as Papin. Of these, Savery, 
Amontons, Newcomen and Cawley were the most successful. The two 
last named have not generally been considered so early in the field ; but, 
from an observation of Switzer, such appears to have been the case. As 
weekly and monthly ' Journals of Arts ' and ' Mechanics' Magazines ' had 
not then been introduced, those who were disposed to communicate their 
discoveries to the public had no appropriate medium for doing so, except 
by a separate publication, and this mode but an exceedingly small number 
of inventors ever adopted : hence it is that not only the dates of several 
modern inventions are uncertain, but numerous devices and valuable 
floating thoughts have, with their authors, been constantly passing into 
utter oblivion. The history of steam as a mechanical agent affords signal 
proofs of the advantages of inventors recording their ideas : thus the name 
of Decaus had long been forgotten, when an old tract of his was disco- 
vered containing the device we have figured at page 410. This he pro- 
bably considered the most trifling thing in his book, yet on account of it 
a place has been claimed for him among the immortal authors of the steam- 
engine. Moreland, of whose speaking trumpet an account was inserted 
in the sixth volume of the Philosophical Transactions, and his ideas of the 
power required to force water to different elevations in the ninth, omitted 
to publish through the same or any other medium a description of his 
steam-engine ; and by this neglect has lost a large portion of honor that 
might have been attached to his name. The same may be said of Garay, 
Ttamseye and Worcester. Savery, however, knew better, for he laid his 
machine before the Royal Society and got it noticed in their Transactions; 
and when he had subsequently improved it, he published a separate ac- 
count with illustrations ; in consequence of which he has sometimes been 
considered the author as well as describer of the first working steam- 
engine. 

Of Savery's personal history, less has transpired than of either More- 
land's or Worcester's. He evidently was a man of great energy, who 
raised himself from obscurity by his talents — a self-made man. According 
to a tradition he commenced life as a working miner, and in process of time 



454 Savery's Project for propelling Boats. [Book IV. 

became an engineer and thus acquired the title of Captain, agreeably to 
a custom which is said still to prevail among the Cornish miners. He 
seems to have acquired a competence, if not wealth, previous to the com- 
mencement of his experiments on steam, and we shall find that he was as 
independent in his spirit as in his purse. Switzer, who was intimately 
acquainted with him, says he was a member of the board of commissioners 
for the sick and wounded ; but this was probably in the latter part of his 
life, and subsequent to the introduction of his steam machines. 

The first invention of Savery that we meet with is in a pamphlet pub- 
lished by him in 1698, on the propulsion of ships in a calm. His plan 
consisted of paddle-wheels to be worked by the crew. In the first edition 
of Harris's Lexicon Technicum, A. D. 1704, there is a description, and in 
the second, 1710, a figure of Savery's " engine for rowing ships." A 
horizontal shaft passes through the vessel between decks, and to each end 
a paddle-wheel is attached. On the middle of the shaft is a pinion or 
trundle wheel, and underneath a capstan upon which a cog wheel is fixed, 
whose teeth are made to work between those of the pinion. A number 
of bars are arranged in the capstan, and the crew were to apply their 
strength to these as in raising an anchor. As the officers of the admiralty 
after examination declined to adopt it, Savery tells them he had two other 
important inventions, which he would not disclose until they did him jus- 
tice in this ! He even held up his opponents to ridicule. On the Surveyor 
of the Navy, who reported against the adoption of his plan as one neither 
new nor useful, he was very severe. At that time large wigs were com- 
monly worn, and Savery gave a smart rap on that which covered the 
head of his official adversary. " It is [he observed] as common for lies 
and nonsense to be disguised by a jingle of words, as for a blockhead to be 
hid by abundance of peruke." Had Savery been of a timid disposition, 
we should probably never have heard of him. After enduring one or 
two rebuffs in attempting to introduce his inventions, he would have re- 
tired and sunk unknown into the grave, like thousands of inventors before 
him. 

Of the few incidents preserved respecting his private life, there are two 
from which it seems that he loved a glass of good wine and a pipe of to- 
bacco ; and that, ta obtain them, he was in the habit of visiting a tavern. 
Let not those who eschew such things complain of us for unnecessarily 
mentioning them, for Savery's first experiments on steam were made in a 
bar-room, with a wine flask and a tobacco pipe. At such a place and with 
such implements he is said to have become acquainted with the principles 
of his famous machine. The circumstance has not been commonly known, 
or some scientific Boniface would, long ere now, have adopted Savery's 
head for a sign ; and artists would have made him, in the act of experi- 
menting, the subject of a picture. There is a rich but neglected field for 
historical painters in the facts and incidents connected with the origin and 
development of useful mechanism. 

According to Desaguliers, Savery declared that he found out the power 
of steam by chance, and in the following manner : " Having drank a flask 
of Florence [wine] at a tavern, and thrown the empty flask upon the fire, 
he call'd for a bason of water to wash his hands, and perceiving that the 
little wine left in the flask had filled up the flask with steam, he took the 
flask by the neck and plunged the mouth of it under the surface of the 
water in the bason ; and the water of the bason was immediately driven 
up into the flask by the pressure of the air."* This illustration of the ascent 

* Exper. Philosophy, edition of 1744, vol. ii, page 4G6. 



Chap. 8. 



His first Steam-Engine, 



455 



of water into a vessel from which the air had been expelled, by steam, was 
of course not new in Savery's time, although it appears to have been so 
to him. Switzer gives a different account. " The first hint from which 
it is said he took this engine was from a tobacco pipe, which he immers'd 
to wash or cool it, as is sometimes done : he discover'd by the rarefaction 
of the air in the tube, by the heat or steam of the water and the gravitation 
or impulse of the exterior air, that the water was made to spring through 
the tube of the pipe in a wonderful surprising manner." 8 It was an old 
practice of veteran smokers, when their (clay) pipes became blackened 
through use, and more particularly when choked or furred up, to placo 
them in a bright fire till they became red hot, then to remove and allow 
them to cool. By this operation they were whitened and purified like the 
incombustible cloth of the ancients, which was cleansed in the same way. 
But frequently when taken from the fire the mouths of the pipes were 
plunged slowly into water ; steam was thus formed, and rushing through 
the tubes, was sometimes preceded, often accompanied, and sometime? 
followed by jets of water. There are however different causes, and far 
from obvious ones, for the liquid issuing through tobacco pipes under such 
circumstances, so that it is difficult to perceive what inference Savery drew 
from the experiment. 

But whatever may have led Savery to the subject of steam, he had so 
far matured his ideas respecting its application to raise water as to erect 

several engines, and to secure a 
patent as early as 1698. In June 
of the following year he submitted 
a working model to the Royal So- 
ciety, and made successful experi- 
ments with it at the same time. A 
figure of this engine was published 
in the Transactions of that year, and 
may also be found in the first volume 
of Lowthorp's Abridgment. No. 
193 is a copy. It consisted of a 
close boiler, B, set in a brick furnace 
A, and two receivers D D support- 
ed on a stand, and made of strong 
copper and air-tight. A suction pipe 
whose lower end descends into a 
well, or other place whence water 
is to be raised, (which may be about 
24 feet below D D) and whose up- 
per part, divided into two branches, 
communicates with the top of the 
receivers. Each branch is furnished 
with a valve at E E, opening up 
wards, to prevent the water from 
returning when once raised. The 
lower part of the forcing pipe G has 
also two branches, FF, which communicate with the bottom of the receivers, 
and these branches have also valves, E E, like the others opening upwards. 
Each receiver has a communication with the upper part of the boiler by 
steam pipes and cocks C C. 

The operation was as follows : — The boiler was two thirds filled with 




No. 193. Sayery'e First Engine. A. D. 1698. 



a Hydrostatics, edition of 3729, page 325. 



456 



Savery's Single Engine. 



[Book IV. 



water, a fir.5 made under it and the steam raised. One of the cocks was 
then opened, and the steam passing through filled the receiver by driving 
the air previously within it into the forcing pipe : the cock was then closed, 
and the steam within the receiver soon became condensed by the cold air 
in contact with its exterior surface, or by pouring cold water upon it ; 
hence a vacuum was produced within, and consequently the water in which 
the lower end of the suction pipe was immersed was driven up by the 
pressure of the atmosphere so as to fill the void. When this had taken 
place the same cock was again opened, and the steam rushing in urged by 
its expansive force the contents of the receiver up the forcing pipe. In 
this manner water was alternately raised into and expelled from both 
vessels. 

As a practical miner, and consequently conversant with the subject of 
raising water on a large scale, Savery was better qualified to carry his 
views into operation than a mere philosopher. His first essay in employing 
steam was a proof of this. " I have heard him say myself [observes Switzer] 
that the very first time he play'd, it was in a potter's house at Lambeth, 
where tho' it was a small engine, yet it [the water] forc'd its way through 
the roof, and struck up the tiles in a manner that surpris'd all the spectators." 




No. 194. Savery's Single Engine. 

Sometimes Savery employed but one receiver. No. 194 represents an 
engine of this kind, erected by him at Kensington. A description of it 
was first published by Mr. Bradley in his " New Improvements of Planting 
and Gardening." It is also figured and described by Switzer, who exa- 
mined it and thought it " the plainest and best proportion'd of any " he had 
seen. Its effects were considered proportionally greater than those with 
two receivers. C, a spherical boiler of the capacity of forty gallons, and 
charged through the tunnel. B, the receiver, which held thirteen gallons 
A, the suction pipe, sixteen feet long and three inches bore. D, the forc- 
ing pipe, of the same bore and forty two feet long. A valve opening 
upwards was placed in A, and another at the lower part of D, at H. E, 
the steam pipe, an inch in diameter. Gr, a sliding valve or cock, furnished 
with a lever handle. F, a cock in the forcing pipe, to admit cold water 



Chap. 8.] Publication of the Miner's Friend. 457 

to flow upon the receiver. A pipe attached to the tunnel descended into 
the boiler and served the purpose of a gauge cock. 

The operation will be understood from the description of figure No. 193. 
By turning the handle of Gr steam is admitted into B, and as soon as the 
air is expelled from the latter, G is closed and F opened ; the affusion of 
cold water (see the figure) quickly condenses the contained vapor, and 
hence the receiver becomes charged with water by the pressure of the 
atmosphere through the suction pipe A. F is then shut and G opened, 
when the steam issuing from the boiler displaces the water from the re- 
ceiver, and having no other way to escape the liquid is driven up the pipe 
D into the reservoir prepared to receive it. As soon as all the water is 
expelled from the receiver, (which was known by applying the hand to 
the lower part, for it would be hot) Gr is shut and F again opened, when 
the operation is repeated as before. 

"When this engine begins to work [says Switzer] you may raise four of 
the receivers full in one minute, which is fifty two gallons, [less the quan- 
tities drawn from F for the purposes of condensation] — and at that rate in 
an hour's time may be flung up 3120 gallons. The prime cost of such 
an engine is about fifty pound, as I myself have had it from the ingenious 
author's own mouth. It must be noted that this engine is but a small one, 
in comparison of many others of this kind that are made for coal-works ; 
but this is sufficient for any reasonable family, and other uses required for 
it in watering all middling gardens." 

Here is no provision made to replenish the boiler with water except 
through the tunnel : hence the working of the machine had to be stopped, 
and the steam within the boiler allowed to escape, before a fresh supply 
could be admitted. Under such circumstances the boilers were very 
liable to become injured by the fire when the water became low. They 
were also exposed to destruction from another cause, the force of the 
steam; for they had no safety-valves to regulate it, and hence the necessity 
of the following instructions : " When you have rais'd water enough, and 
you design to leave off working the engine, take away all the fire from 
under the boiler, and open the cock [connected to the tunnel] to let out 
the steam, which would otherwise, was it to remain confin'd, perhaps 
burst the engine." 

Savery, from his profession, was aware of the want of an improved 
mode of draining mines. The influence of the useful arts in enriching a 
nation was then beginning to be understood. A stimulus was imparted to 
manufactures, and the demand for coal and the ores of England rapidly 
increased. As a necessary consequence the depth of the mines increased 
also ; and hence proprietors became anxious to possess some device for 
clearing them of water, and by which the old, inefficient and excessively 
expen/ve horse-gins and buckets might be dispensed with. The cost of 
drainage was so great in some mines, that their produce hardly equalled 
the cost of working them : in one mine five hundred horses were constantly 
employed. Numerous novel projects had been tried and abandoned : 
what they were we are not informed, but as Ramseye and Worcester and 
probably others had proposed Jire machines for the purpose, steam had 
probably been tried in some way or other and had failed. Having greatly 
improved his machine, Savery published an account of it, illustrated with 
engravings, in a pamphlet entitled The Miner's Friend ; or a Description 
of an Engine for Raising Water by Fire, with an Answer to the Objections 
against it. London, printed for S. Crouch, 1702. In his address he begs 
proprietors not to let the failure of other plans prejudice them against the 
trial of his. " Its power [he observes] is in a manner infinite and unlimited, 

58 



453 



Savery's Double Engine. 



[Book IV 



and will draw you water 500 or a 1000 feet high, were any pit so deep. 

I dare undertake that this engine shall raise you as much water 

for eight-pence, as will cost you a shilling to raise the like with your old 
engines." The original figures in the Miner's Friend were inserted in 
Harris's Lexicon Technicum, in 1704, and copied into Switzer's Hydro- 
statics in 1729, and by Desaguliers in his Experimental Philosophy in 1744, 
(which works are before us) and subsequently into almost every treatise 
on the steam-engine. No. 195 is a reduced copy: the figure of the fire 
man is an addition. 




No. 195. Savery's Double Engine. A. D. 1702. 

A detailed description of this elegant apparatus is not necessary, since 
its operation will be understood from the explanation of the two preceding 
machines. It is substantially the same as No. 193, except that this one 
has two boilers, which are heated by separate furnaces, Gr H. The addi 
tional boiler Gr was designed merely to supply the other with hot water, 
and need not therefore divert the attention of the reader in realizing the 
working of the essential parts. The upper end of the suction pipe shown 
at the mouth of the pit consists of two branches, which are connected to 
eimilar branches on the lower part of the forcing pipe N. The suction 
valves are at B A, and the forcing ones at E F, all opening upwards. 



Chap. 8.] Its excellent features — Coupling Screws. 459 

Between these valves two short curved tubes connect the bottoms of the 
receivers I M with the branches, as represented, and two other bent tubes, 
P Q, unite the top of the receivers with the boiler H. On the top of this 
ooiler, and forming a part of it, is a stout round plate, having two openings 
of the same size as the bore of the tubes last mentioned. In these open- 
ings the two steam tubes P Q terminate. Between the openings, and 
on the under side of the plate, is a moveable disk, which by a short arm 
is connected to an axle and moved by the long lever shown on the top of 
the boiler ; so that by moving this lever the disk can be made to close 
either opening, so as to admit or exclude steam from the receivers, and 
answering every purpose of a three-way cock. It is made somewhat on 
the plan of the one in No. 189, page 421. The face of the disk is ground 
smooth, so as to fit close to the under side of the plate, against which it is 
pressed by the steam. The perpendicular axle by which the disk is turned 
passes through the plate, and the opening is made tight by a stuffing box. 
(The plate and moveable disk are represented in the small figure at the top, 
one of the openings being covered by the disk and the other exposed.) 
A small cistern, U, is placed over the receivers, and kept supplied with 
cold water from the forcing pipe by means of a ball cock, viz. a cock 
that is opened and shut by a ball floating in the cistern. From the bottom 
of this cistern a short pipe, T, proceeds ; and to it is connected, by a swivel 
joint or stuffing box, another one at right angles. This pipe furnishes 
water to condense the steam in the receivers, over both of which it can be 
moved by the rod attached to the plug of the cock as shown in the figure. 
The upper cistern denotes the place where the water raised by the engine 
is to be discharged. 

A communication is made between the boilers by a siphon or bent tube, 
P., whose legs extend nearly to the bottom of the boilers. In the leg 
within the small boiler is a valve opening upwards, which permits the 
water of Gr to pass into H, but prevents any returning from the latter. 
When the attendant wishes to inject into H a fresh supply of water, he 
increases the little fire kept up under the boiler G, (which is always kept 
supplied with water by the pipe S,) and as soon as the liquid boils and 
the force of the steam exceeds that in H, the contents of Gr, both steam 
and hot water, are forced through the valve ; and thus H is kept supplied 
without the action of the machine being stopped. The cock on the pipe 
S is then opened, the small boiler again charged, and the water becomes 
gradually heated ; so that by the time it is wanted in the other boiler, a 
small addition to the fuel quickly raises its temperature, and it is again 
forced in as before. 

The quantity of water in the boilers was ascertained by gauge cocks. 
These were inserted at the top, (see figure) and pipes soldered to them 
descended to different depths. The principal boiler had two of these, the 
other but one. 

The general arrangement of this engine and the adaptation of its various 
parts to each other are admirable, and could hardly be improved. The 
obviously good workmanship — the improved form of the receivers — and 
the connection of these with the boilers and pipes, and the latter with each 
other, by coupling screws, thus securing easy access to the valves — are 
highly creditable to Savery and the workmen he employed. Every part 
was made of the best materials. The cocks, coupling screws, regulator, 
valves, and all the pipes immediately connected with them, were of brass; 
while the boilers, receivers and suction pipes were of " the best hammered 
copper, of sufficient thickness to sustain the force of the working engine : 
in short, [continues the inventor] the engine is so naturally adapted to 



460 Joints melted by Steam — Origin of Savery' s Engine. [Book IV 

perform what is required, that even those of the most ordinary and meanest 
capacity may work it for some years without injury, if not hired, or em- 
ploy'd by some base person on purpose to destroy it ;" — that is, by inat- 
tention or design to permit steam to accumulate within the boilers till they 
were burst. Some device to prevent this was wanting, viz. a safety-valve 
or something analogous to it ; and it is astonishing that he never thought 
of such a thing, but permitted his machine for lack of it to fall into dis- 
repute. 

The miners could not be induced to adopt it, in consequence of the 
danger of explosion. " Savery [says Desaguliers] made a great many 
experiments to bring this machine to perfection, and did erect several, 
which raised water very well for gentlemen's seats, but could not succeed 
for mines, or supplying towns where the water was to be raised very high 
and in great quantities ; for then the steam required being boiled up to 

such a strength, as to be ready to tear all the vessels to pieces. 

I have known Captain Savery at York's Buildings make steam 8 or 10 
times stronger than common air ; and then its heat was so great, that it 
would melt common solder, and its strength so great as to blow open 
several of the joints of his machine ; so that he was forced to be at the 
pains and charge to have all his joints soldered with spelter or hard solder." 
Ex. Philos. ii, 467. 

There has been much discussion respecting the origin of this famous 
engine ; some writers contending that it was wholly Savery's own, others 
that he derived it from one of Worcester's, or from the Century of In- 
ventions. Desaguliers asserts that Savery, to conceal its origin, " bought 
up all the Marquis of Worcester's books that he could purchase in Pater- 
noster Row, and elsewhere, and burn'd 'em in the presence of the gentle- 
man his friend, who told me this." But as Savery denied being indebted 
to any one for it, and as he was certainly a man of great mechanical genius, 
it is probable that the doctor was imposed upon by his informant. It is 
not likely that Savery would have committed such an act in the presence 
of a witness, when there was not only no necessity for one, but every 
possible inducement for secrecy. Many years before the publication of 
this charge by Desaguliers (in 1744) the opinion was prevalent that the 
machine was not original with Savery. In 1729 Switzer remarks, " others 
say that the learned Marquis of Worcester, in his Century of Inventions, 
which book I have not seen, gave the first hint for this raising of water." 
(Hydr. 325.) Dr. Hutton, in his Math. Dictionary, asserts, though on what 
authority we know not, that Savery knew more of Moreland's experiments 
than he was willing to acknowledge ; and Desaguliers maintains that he 
invented the story of the experiment with the wine flask " to make people 
believe that he had not got the idea from Worcester's Century of 
Inventions." 

In reply to the above it may be remarked, that independently of those 
coincidences of thought that always have and will happen to inventors, 
there are circumstances which strongly corroborate Savery's own account. 
In the first place, the experiment with the wine flask was one very likely 
to occur in the manner he has mentioned, and to a mind like his would 
naturally lead to a practical application of it. His thoughts, we are told, 
" were always employed in hydrostatics or hydraulics, or in the improve- 
ment of water-works." Then there is no evidence that he was much of 
a reader : had he been conversant with books, he would not have proposed 
the propulsion of vessels with paddle-wheels as new. These occurred to 
him as they have done to thousands in every age when devising means to 
increase the speed of boats ; and so it may have been with his steam ma- 



Chap. 8.] Modifications of Savery's Engine. 461 

chine : a device like it would naturally be the result of the experiment 
with the wine flask, and even without it, when his thoughts were once 
directed to raising water by steam. Moreover, Savery was ignorant of 
the safety-valve, the very thing wanted to remove the most formidable 
objection to his machine ; and yet, as we have shown, he might have 
found it in some popular works on chemistry and distillation, — besides 
which, Papin's improved application of it had been published several 
years. (The single machine figured No. 194 was erected by Savery 
himself as late as 1711 or '12, and it had no safety-valve.) 

But whether he derived the hint from Worcester or not, he is entitled 
to all the honor he has received. He was the first effectually to introduce 
the device, and the first to publish a description of it in detail. He con- 
cealed nothing, but, like a sensible and practical man, explained the whole, 
and left it to its own merits. No one's claims to a place in the history of ' 
the steam-engine were better earned, whether he be considered the rein 
ventor, or improver only of Worcester's 68th proposition. There are 
several points of resemblance in the characters of Savery and Oliver Evans. 
By their energy and indomitable perseverance they forced their inventions 
into public notice in spite of public apathy, and so worked their way into 
the temple of honorable fame. Both published curious pamphlets, that 
will preserve their names and inventions from oblivion. 

But Savery's steam-engine does not belong to the same family as the 
modern one, nor can he be said to have contributed to the invention of the 
latter, except so far as making his contemporaries more familiar with the 
mechanical properties of aqueous vapor. 'Tis true he employed this fluid 
in close vessels, and so far he succeeded ; but his ideas seem to have been 
wholly confined to its application to raise water, and in the most direct 
manner — hence he never thought of pistons. Had he turned his attention to 
impart motion to one of these, he would have left little for his successors 
to do ; but as it was, he did not lead engineers any nearer to the piston 
engine. He proposed to propel machinery by discharging the water he 
raised upon an overshot wheel ; hence his patent was " for raising water, 
and occasioning motion to all sorts of mill work." But this was obviously 
an afterthought, an accidental result, rather than one originally designed 
or looked for. A piston and cylinder only could have given his machine 
a permanent place in the arts, either as a hydraulic or a motive one. He 
accomplished almost all that could be realized without them. The most 
splendid talents of the present times could have done little more. Papin 
abandoned the piston and cylinder, and in doing so quenched a halo of 
glory that would have shone round his name for ever ; and Savery, for 
want of them, notwithstanding his ingenuity, perseverance and partial 
success, lived to see his device in a great measure laid aside. Savery 
died about the year 1716. 

As Savery's engine became known, several additions to and modifica- 
tions of it were proposed. A few of these may be noticed : — 

Drs. Desaguliers and Gravesande, from some experiments, concluded 
that single engines were more economical than double ones — a single 
receiver being " emptied three times whilst two succeeding ones [of a 
double engine] could be emptied but once a piece." Of single engines 
Desaguliers erected seven between the years 1717 and 1744. "The first 
was for the late Czar, Peter I, for his garden at Petersburgh, where it 
was set up. The boiler of this engine was spherical, (as they must all be 
in this way, when the steam is much stronger than air) and held between 
five and six hogsheads ; and the receiver held one hogshead, and was 
filled and emptied four times in a minute. The water was drawn up by 



462 Leopold — Blalcey — Rivatz. [Book IV. 

suction or the pressure of the atmosphere 29 feet high, out of a well, and 
then pressed up 11 feet higher. Another engine of this sort which I put 
up for a friend about five and twenty years ago, [1719] drew up the water 
29 feet from the well, and then it was forced up by the pressure of the 
steam 24 feet higher," &c. But these " improved " engines differed in 
reality but little from Savery's single one, No. 194. Desaguliers furnished 
his boiler with Papin's steelyard safety-valve; a three-way cock alternately 
admitted steam into the receiver and water from the forcing pipe to con- 
dense it : in other respects the engines were much the same. Savery 
made no provision to secure his boilers from being exploded ; but the 
safety-valve was not always a preventive in former times, any more than 
at present. " About three years ago [says Desaguliers] a man who was 
entirely ignorant of the nature of the engine, and without any instructions, 
undertook to work it ; and having hung the weight at the farther end of 
the steel-yard, in order to collect more steam to make his work the quicker, 
he hung also a very heavy plumber's iron upon the end of the steel-yard: 
the consequence prov'd fatal, for after some time the steam, not being able 
with the safety-clack to raise up the steel-yard loaded with all this unu- 
sual weight, burst the boiler with a great explosion, and kill'd the poor 
man." Exp. Philos. ii, 489. 

In a double engine by Leopold, A. D. 1720, the receivers were placed 
below the water they were to raise : hence the principle of condensation 
was not required — for as soon as the steam expelled the contents of a re- 
ceiver, a communication was opened between the upper part of the latter 
and the atmosphere, so as to allow the steam to escape and a fresh supply 
o£ water to enter below. He produced a rotary movement by discharging 
the water into the buckets of a water-wheel. 

When steam is admitted into a receiver, a portion is immediately con 
densed by the low temperature of the vessel and the cold water within ; 
so that not till a film or thin stratum of hot water is thus formed on the 
surface, can the full force of the vapor be exerted in expelling the contents. 
This waste of steam is not however so great as might be imagined, because 
the water with which it comes in contact still remains on the surface, 
having become lighter than the mass below by the accession of heat, and 
consequently preventing the heat from descending : yet various attempts 
were made to interpose some non-conducting substance between the steam 
and the water. Papin, as we have seen, used a floating piston. In 1766, 
Mr. Blakey, an enterprising English mechanic, took out a patent for the 
application of a stratum of oil or air. To use these he made some corres- 
ponding alterations in the receiver ; but the advantages were not so great 
as had been expected. Blakey also introduced a new boiler, consisting 
of tubes or cylinders completely -filled with water and imbedded in the 
fire. It caused considerable excitement among scientific men, but the 
danger arising from them, and the explosion of one or more, caused them 
to be laid aside. He spent several years in France, where he erected 
some of his engines. He wrote on several subjects connected with the 
arts. There is a copious and interesting extract from his Dissertation on 
the Invention and Progress of Fire Machinery, in the Gentlemen's Maga- 
zine for 1792, page 502. 

Other modifications of Savery's engine were made previous to and 
about Blakey's time, of which no particular accounts are now extant. In 
his Comparisons of French and English Arts, (article Horology) Blakey 
says, "About 1748 another Swiss, named Rivatz, appeared in Paris: 
he understood all the known principles and methods for regulating time in 
equal parts, to which he added others of his invention. And I 



Chap. 8.] Gensanne — De Moura — Amontons 1 Fire Mill. 463 

can say without pretending to prejudice any one's merit, that I never 
met with any French or English man who had so much ingenuity and 
knowledge in mechanical, hydraulic, fire machinery principles, &c. as Ri 
vatz." (Gent. Mag. 1702, page 404.) 

In 1734 M. Gensanne, a French gentleman, made some improvements 
on Savery's engine, and by additional mechanism rendered it self-acting. 
The alternate descent of two vessels of water opened and closed the 
cocks, on much the same principle as that exhibited in Fludd's pressure 
engine, page 354. (Machines Approuvees, tome vii, 222.) In 1740 M. 
De Moura, a Portuguese, accomplished the same thing by the ascent and 
descent of a copper ball or float within the receiver ; but the device was 
too complicated for practical purposes. It is figured and described by 
Smeaton in the Philosophical Transactions, vol. xlvii, 437, in the Supple- 
ment to Harris's Dictionary of the Arts, and in other English works. In 
1766, Cambray de Rigny, an Italian, made some additions to Savery's 
engine so as to make it in a great measure independent of manual assistance. 
Professor Francois, of Lausanne, having been consulted respecting the 
draining of an extensive marsh between the lakes Neuchatel, Bienne and 
Morat, adopted a fire engine on Savery's plan, and which he made self- 
acting by a more simple device than either of the preceding. A descrip- 
tion and good figure of his machine may be seen in the fourth volume of 
the Repertory of Arts, (1794) page 203. Nuncarrow's improvement on 
Savery's is described in the American Phil. Transactions, vol. i, 209, in 
Tilloch's Phil. Mag. vol. ix, 300, and in Galloway's History of the Steam- 
Engine. An English patent was issued in 1805 to James Boaz, and an- 
other in 1S19 to Mr. Pontifex, both for improvements on Savery's engine. 
For further information see the Repertory of Arts, Nicholson's Journal, 
vol. i, 419, and the Journal of the Franklin Institute. 

" A commodious way of substituting the action of fire instead of the 
force of men and horses to move machines," was proposed in 1699, by M. 
Amontons, one of the earliest and most useful members of the French 
Academy of Sciences. He named his machine afire mill. It resembled 
a large wheel, supported on a horizontal axis, but was composed of two 
concentric hollow rings, each of which was divided by partitions into a 
dozen separate cells. The small or interior ring was at a considerable 
distance from the axis, and the cells communicated with each other through 
openings made in the partitions and covered by valves or clacks. The 
cells of the exterior rings had no communication with each other, but a 
pipe from each connected them with the inner ones. The outer cells 
contained air, and about one half of the inner ones contained water. The 
object was to keep this water always on one side, that its weight might 
act tangentially, and so cause the wheel to revolve, and the machine con- 
nected to it. A furnace was built close to a portion of the periphery, and 
the lower part of the wheel was immersed in water, to a depth equal to 
that of the exterior cells. When the fire was kindled, the air in the cell 
against which the flame impinged became rarefied, and, by means of a 
pipe communicating with an inner cell below the axle, forced the water 
contained in that cell into an upper one. This caused that side of the wheel 
to preponderate, which brought another air cell in contact with the fire, 
and the fluid becoming expanded by the heat forced up the contents of 
another of the inner cells into a higher one, as before : in this way every 
part of the periphery of the wheel was brought in succession in contact 
with the fire, and the water in the inner cells kept constantly rising on 
one side of the wheel, thus causing the latter to revolve. The air in the 



464 Newcomcn and Cawley. [Book IV. 

outer cells was cooled as they passed through the water in which the 
lower part of the wheel dipped. 

This device of Amontons is rather an air than a steam machine. It 
hardly belongs to this part of our subject; but as it may be considered 
the type of most of the steam wheels subsequently brought forward, we 
have been induced to notice it here. As a theoretical device, it is highly 
meritorious, but as a practical one, of little value. There is in Martyn and 
Chambers's abridged History of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, Lond. 
1742, a full account of this wheel, and of the experiments from which it 
was deduced. (See vol. i, 69.) It was simplified by Leopold. 

Towards the close of the 17th century there lived in Dartmouth, a small 
seaport town on the English channel, two mechanics who combined their 
energies to devise a machine for raising water by means of steam. Their 
names were Thomas Newcomen and John Cawley ; the first a blacksmith, 
but sometimes called an ironmonger, the latter a plumber and glazier. 
The circumstances that led them to the subject have not been recorded, 
nor have the particular contributions of each been specified. Their efforts 
were however eminently successful, for to them belongs the honor of 
having permanently established the employment of steam as a mechanical 
agent. The date of the commencement of their efforts is unknown, but 
from the observation of a contemporary writer it seems to have been as 
early as the first attempts of Savery. 

The principal objection of miners to Savery's machine, viz. the enor- 
mous force of the steam required, and the consequent frequent explosion 
of the boilers, &c. was completely avoided by Newcomen and Cawley ; 
for they used steam of little or no greater force than cooks do in common 
cauldrons — hence it could never explode a boiler or endanger human life. 
Savery's engine had other disadvantages. It was required to be placed 
within a mine or pit, and in no case farther from the bottom than 25 or 30 
feet ; whereas Newcomen and Cawley 's was erected on the surface, near 
the mouth of the shaft. Moreover, in those mines which were previ- 
ously drained by pumps, it could be used to work these as before, without 
any additional cost for new pipes and pumps; the engine in such cases merely 
superseding the horses and their attendants. Instead of applying steam 
like Savery directly to the water to be raised, these mechanics made use 
of it to give motion to a piston and vibrating beam, and through these to 
common pump rods ; hence the device may be considered rather for im- 
parting motion to machines proper for raising water, than as one of the 
latter. 

It is in evidence that Newcomen had some correspondence respecting 
his machine with Dr. Hooke, and that he was acquainted with what Papin 
had previously done. This however might very well consist with the 
idea of giving motion to a piston originating with himself or partner ; yet 
as their labors were subsequent to those of the French philosopher, their 
claims to it, if they ever made any, could not be sustained. Their machine 
in its essential features is a copy of Guerricke's, and the mode of producing 
a vacuum under the piston similar to Papin's ; but as Papin did not suc- 
ceed, the reintroduction of a device similar to his, and its successful appli- 
cation to the important purpose of draining mines, belong wholly to them ; 
and the merit of doing this was certainly much greater than can ever be 
claimed for the abortion of Papin. Fulton did not invent steam boats, 
but he was the first to demonstrate their utility and to introduce them into 
use here after they had been tried and abandoned in Europe. 

It should not be supposed that the piston engine would not have been 
realized at the close of the 17th or beginning of the 18th century, if Papin 



Chap. 8.] 



Their first Engine. 



465 



and Newcomen had not lived. The spirit of inquiry that was abroad in 
their days, and the number of ingenious men engaged in devising means 
to employ steam as a motive agent, would assuredly have soon brought it 
into use. Indeed, every improvement in the application of steam seems 
to have been always perceived by some contemporary projectors, among 
whom the contest of maturing it was, as in a race, one of speed. " Watt 
[observes Prof. Renwick] found a competitor in Gainsborough, and but a 
few weeks would have placed Stevens on the very eminence where Fulton 
now stands." The circumstances of the times, the increase of English 
manufactures, and the general want of some substitute for animal labor, 
were all then favorable to the introduction of the steam-engine. " Had 
the mines of Cornwall been still wrought near the surface, Savery or New- 
comen would hardly have found a vent for their engines. Had not the 
manufacturers of England been wanting in labor-saving machinery, the 
double-acting engine of Watt would have been suited to no useful appli- 
cation. A very few years earlier than the voyage of Fulton [to Albany] 
the Hudson could not have furnished trade or travel to support a steam 
boat, and the Mississippi was in possession of dispersed hordes of savages." 




No. 196. Newcomen and Cawley's Eugine. A. D. 1705. 

The above figure will sufficiently explain the principles and operation 
of Newcomen and Cawley's first engine ; and, when compared with those 

59 



466 Condensation by Injection discovered by chance. [Book IV 

already noticed, will enable the reader to do justice to all concerned. It 
will be perceived that although steam is an essential agent, it is not the 
primum mobile of the apparatus : the pressure of the atmosphere is the 
first mover, and to excite this only was steam employed. 

A, in the figure, (No. 196) represents a vibrating beam with arched 
ends or sectors, from one of which the main pump rod is suspended by a 
chain. This rod descends into the mine or pit, and is connected to as 
many other rods as there are pumps to be worked. A counterpoise or 
heavy weight m is fixed to the rod, so as to depress it and raise the other 
end of the beam in the position represented, a, the steam cylinder, open 
at top, its sides being surrounded by another, and the space between them 
containing water, r. the piston rod and piston, attached to the beam by 
a chain, b, the boiler, c, gauge cock. N, safety valve with weights 
placed directly upon it. d, a cock to admit steam into the cylinder, e, a 
pipe and cock to convey the water round a, into the well or tank o. f % a 
pipe and cock to supply cold water to condense steam in the cylinder, h, 
another pipe and cock to furnish occasionally a little water to the upper 
side of the piston, to prevent air from passing between the packing and 
sides of the cylinder : this water was kept at the depth of about two inches. 
t t, a pipe proceeding from one of the pumps in the pit to supply the small 
cistern with water. p, a pipe to convey the steam condensed within a 
into the tank o. w the ash pit. x x, flues round the boiler. 

Fire being applied to the boiler and steam generated, the cock d is 
opened and the cylinder filled with steam, . provision being made for the 
escape of the air previously within, d is then closed and f opened, by 
which cold water from the cistern is admitted to flow round a : this con- 
denses the vapor within, and a vacuum being thus formed under the piston, 
the latter is pushed down by the atmosphere ; consequently the opposite 
end of the beam is raised, and with it the pump rods and the load of water 
with which they are burthened. f is now closed and d again opened, 
when the counterpoise m preponderates, the piston is raised, the cylinder 
again filled with steam, and the operation repeated. But previous to the 
admission of vapor the second time into the cylinder, the cocky is closed 
and the one on pipe e opened, to allow the water between the cylinders 
to escape into the tank o, this water having become heated by its contact 
with a. As soon as the cylinder is charged anew with steam, a fresh 
supply of cold water to condense it is admitted by again opening f. 

The amount of force thus excited depends upon the diameter of the 
cylinder a, or the area of its piston, and the state of the vacuum made 
under the latter. The dimensions of a must therefore be proportioned to 
the resistance to be overcome — to the quantity of water to be raised from 
a mine, and the height at which it is to be discharged — and to render an 
engine of the kind effective, the whole of the steam in a should be con- 
densed, and as quickly as possible. These conditions were not very well 
fulfilled by the apparatus as figured above. Time was required for 
the cold water between the cylinders to extend its influence from the cir- 
cumference to the centre of the inner one, in order completely to condense 
the vapor ; hence the movements were extremely slow, the strokes seldom 
exceeding seven or eight per minute. An accidental circumstance pointed 
out the remedy, and greatly increased the effect. As the engine was at 
work, the attendants were one day surprised to see it make several strokes 
much quicker than usual ; and upon searching for the cause, they found, 
says Desaguliers, " a hole in the piston which let the cold water [kept 
upon the piston to prevent the entrance of air at the packing] into the inside 
of the cylinder." The water falling through the steam condensed it al- 



Chap. 8.] Savery claims a share in Newcomen's Patent. 4G7 

most instantaneously, and produced, a vacuum with far less water than 
when applied to the exterior of the cylinder. This led Newcomen to 
remove the outer cylinder, and to insert the lower end of the pipe f into 
the bottom of a, so that on opening the cock f a jet of cold water was 
projected through the vapor. This beautiful device is the origin of * the 
injection pipe still used in low-pressure engines. 

Newcomen and Cawley's engine, as figured page 465, was improved in 
several parts in 1712, and soon after adopted as a hydraulic machine for 
draining the coal and iron mines in various parts of Europe. Very 
elaborate engravings of some used in French mines may be seen in the 
folio edition of Arts et Metiers. See also Desaguliers' Ex. Philos. vol. ii, 
and Switzer's Hydrostatics. 

The application of sectors and chains to pump rods did not originate with 
Newcomen. They are figured by Moxon, and were probably employed 
in working pumps in mines previous to the invention of the steam-engine. 

We have often thought the heaviest charge against Savery was to be 
found in his conduct towards Newcomen and Cawley. Their machine 
was essentially different from his in its principle, construction and modo 
of action, yet he insisted that it was an infringement upon his patent. He 
employed the pressure of the atmosphere in charging his receivers, by 
condensing with cold water the steam within them. So far as regards 
this mode of forming a vacuum, (he in his receivers and they beneath a 
piston) there is a resemblance between the two machines, but no farther ; 
and this plan of making a vacuum was not original with him any more 
than with them. It was no more a new device in his time than his paddle 
wheels were. The object of Newcomen and Cawley in forming a vacuum 
was also quite different from his ; for they did not raise water into the 
vacuity, but employed it solely to excite the pressure of the atmosphere 
upon the upper side of a piston, in order to impart motion to common 
pump rods. Again, he used the expansive force of high steam : this was 
the prominent feature in his machine, and the great power that gave effi- 
ciency to it ; but they did not use this power at all. The weight of the 
external air, not the expansive force of steam, was the jprimum mobile in 
their machine, and it was brought into action by the vapor of water at the 
ordinary boiling point. 

But as they formed a vacuum in their cylinder by the condensation of 
steam, he insisted on having a share in their patent ! The fact was his 
machines had become in a great measure laid aside, and he doubtless per- 
ceived that they were destined to be wholly superseded. Desaguliers 
(in 1744) observes that the progress and improvement of the fire engine 
were stopped by the difficulties and dangers attending it, till Newcomen 
and Cawley " brought it to the present form, in which it is now used, and 
has been near these thirty years." Unless his name was included as a 
joint patentee, Savery threatened an appeal to the law; and it is said his 
influence at court, as commissioner for the sick and wounded, gave weight 
to this ungenerous and unjust demand. Newcomen we are informed was 
a Quaker, or like Cawley a Baptist, and therefore on principle averse to 
legal controversy : he was moreover a man of" a great deal of modesty," 
and so yielded the point. The patent was consequently issued (in 1705) 
" to Thomas Newcomen and John Cawley of Dartmouth, and Thomas 
Savery of London." 

Another point has been generally overlooked : 80 far from Newcomen's 
machine being an infringement or improvement upon Savery's, it was really 
invented as early if not earlier than the latter. Switzer (Savery's friend) 
says, " it [Newcomen's engine] is indeed generally said to be an improrfr 



468 Extensive adoption of Newcomers Engine. [Book IV. 

ment to Savery's engine, but I am well informed that Mr. Newcomen was 
as early in his invention, as Mr. Savery was in his, only the latter being 
nearer the court, had obtain'd his patent before the other knew of it ; on 
which account Mr. Newcomen was glad to come in as a partner to it." 
(Hydrostatics, 342.) That is, as a partner to his own invention. 

To Newcomen and his associate belongs the honor of laying the found- 
ation for the modern engine. The piston engine of Worcester had been 
forgotten, Papin's was an abortion, and Savery probably never thought of 
one ; hence, whether the Dartmouth mechanicians were aware of its pre- 
vious employment or not, to them a large share of merit is justly due. 
They were moreover amiable and unassuming in their manners, and seem 
to have passed through life without exciting much of that envy that em- 
bitters more or less the nights and days of successful inventors. From 
such men, who can withhold expressions of approbation and esteem ? Had 
they been members of the Roman church, they should have been canonized 
— could we believe in the efficacy of prayers for the dead, we would have 
masses performed for the repose of their spirits — and had we the power, 
every contributor to useful mechanism should be commemorated by an 
apotheosis. 

Cawley died in 1717, but the date of Newcomen's decease has not 
been ascertained. 



CHAPTER IX 



General adoption of Newcomen and Cawley's engine — Leopold's machine — Steam applied as a mover 
of general machinery — Wooden and granite boilers— Generating steam by the heat of the sun — Floats — 
Green-houses and dwellings heated by steam — Cooking by steam — Explosive engines — Vapor engines — 
English, French and American motive engines — Woisard's air machine — Vapor of mercury — Liquefied 
gases — Decomposition and recomposition of water. 



Newcomen and Cawley's engines were found to answer the purpose 
of raising water so well, that in a few years they were introduced into 
Russia, Sweden, France and Hungary ; and about 1760, one was imported 
by the proprietors of the old copper mine near Belleville, New Jersey. 
They in fact imparted a new and very beneficial impulse to mining opera- 
tions, and quickly raised the value of mining stock. Deluged works were 
recovered, old mines deepened, and new ones opened, in various districts, 
both in Great Britain and continental Europe : nor were they confined to 
draining mines, but were employed to raise water for the use of towns 
and cities, and even to supply water-wheels of mills. By exciting the 
attention of ingenious men to their improvement, they became the means 
of extending manufactures generally, and introduced one which had never 
before been known in the world, viz. the fabrication of motive engines — a 
manufacture upon which the wealth, power and happiness of nations are 
destined in a great degree hereafter to depend. 



Chap. 9.] 



Leopold's Engine. 



469 



Leopold, to whom we have frequently referred, reflecting on Papin's 
experiments, suggested the following application of steam to move pistons 
and to raise water : — 




No. 197. Leopold's High Pressure EDgine. A. D. 1720. 

Two steam cylinders, open at top and provided with pistons a b, were 
placed over the boiler c, from the upper part of which a four-way cock d 
admitted steam alternately into the bottom of each. The pistons were 
connected by inflexible rods to the ends of two working beams, and to the 
opposite extremities of the beams were connected, by similar rods, the 
pistons/* ,§■ of two forcing pumps, whose lower parts were placed in the 
water to be raised. An attendant turned the plug of the cock to admit 
steam under one piston, which was pushed up by the expansive force of 
the fluid, and consequently the piston of the pump connected to the same 
beam was forced down, and the water in its chamber driven up the rising 
main i. The cock was then turned to admit steam into the other cylinder, 
whose piston was raised in like manner ; at the same time one passage of 
the cock opened a communication with the interior of the first cylinder 
and the external air, so as to allow the steam within to escape. — (See the 
figure.) 

This is the first high-pressure piston engine figured in books. It has been 
greatly admired, and yet as represented it is useless and impracticable ; 
for when the steam pistons were once raised the whole would remain im- 
moveable, there being no means for causing them to descend. Had Leo- 
pold used one beam instead of two, and placed a pump and steam cylinder 
under each end, the device would have been complete and very effective. 

It is singular that the researches of Leopold had not made him ac- 
quainted with the fact that four-way cocks were used long before Papin, 
to whom he attributes them. 

With this device of Leopold, we take leave of steam machines. Hitherto 
they had been employed only to raise water, but the period was now ap- 
proaching when the agency of this fluid as a first mover of machinery in 
general, was to become indefinitely extended. The engines of Newcomen 



470 Wooden and Granite Boilers. [Book IV. 

and Leopold were the links which connected the labors of Heron, Garay, 
Porta, Worcester, Moreland, Papin and Savery with those of Watt. They 
opened the way for the introduction of the crank and fly-wheel, which 
changed completely the character of the old engines. Like Worcester's 
and Savery's, Newcomen's engine required the constant attention of an 
attendant to open and close the cocks ; but a boy named Potter employed 
in this service, stimulated by the love of play, ingeniously added cords to 
the levers by which the cocks were turned, and connecting the other ends 
of the cords to the moving beam, rendered the machine self-acting, and 
thus acquired opportunities of joining his sportive companions unknown 
to his employers. Iron rods were soon after substituted for the cords by 
Beighton, and finally Watt and Gainsborough, Hornblower, Evans and 
Trevithick, &c. appeared and made the steam-engine the great prime 
mover of man. 



A few subordinate devices relating to steam and steam-engines may here 
be noticed. There is in Stuart's Anecdotes an historical note respecting 
wooden boilers, in which water is heated by furnaces or flues within 
them. They are traced back to 1663. It may be interesting to some 
readers to state, that they were in use in the preceding century, and that 
the device in all probability dates from even a more remote period. They 
are described in Gesner's " Secrets of Phisicke and Philosophic" In the 
English translation of 1599, by Baker, to which we have already had re- 
course, they are twice figured, and thus described : "A wooden bowle or 
tubbe of a sufficient compasse and largnesse over : in the middes of which 
tubbe erect and set from the bottom unto the edge or brinke of the same, 
or rather above it, a great copper vessel, in the forme of a hollow pype. 
Let a parte of the copper pype descende, in such sort and manner, that 
the water be contained betweene the outward bored wall of the pype and the 
parte within of the tubbe : But within that parte of the pype which de- 
scended by the bottome of the tubbe, let the fire be put and kindled, for the 
heating of the water." Folio 25. The third part of Glauber's Treatise on 
Philosophical Furnaces also relates to wooden boilers, in which liquids 
were heated by a copper retort placed in a fire, and whose neck was in- 
serted in the lower part of the boiler, the liquid circulating through the 
retort. Eng. Trans, by Dr. French, London, 1652. 

We have been informed that an enormous steam boiler for an atmos- 
pheric engine was in use many years ago at a copper mine near Redruth, 
in Cornwall, England, which was composed entirely of large blocks of 
granite, or " moor stone." The water was heated by a furnace, from 
which iron pipes traversed backwards and forwards in the water. 

The old chemists often boiled liquids by the sun's heat, and a writer in 
the London Magazine for 1750 proposed to substitute the solar rays for 
common fires in heating steam-engine boilers, viz. by collecting the 'rays in 
a focus "by means of a common burning glass, or a large concave reflecting 
mirror of polished metal, or perhaps more conveniently by the newly re- 
vived method of Archimedes, which by throwing the focal point to a greater 
distance may be capable of many advantages that the others have not." 
He anticipates three objections : — 1. "The focus will vary with the motion 
of the sun." To obviate this he proposes to make the mirror moveable 
by machinery attached to the engine itself. 2. " The extreme heat of the 
focal point." If this should be too intense, it may be moderated by en- 
larging the focus. 3. " The sun does not constantly shine" — therefore the 
engine must stop. This objection, he remarks, is common to wind, tide 



Chap. 9.] Explosive Engines. 471 



and other mills; and he thinks in the hot months, at least, a steam-engine 
might be made to raise by the sun's heat water enough from a well to 
replenish fish ponds &c. as opportunity served. We have long thought 
that solar heat will yet supersede artificial fires to a limited extent in raising 
steam, as well as in numerous other operations in the arts, especially in 
places where fuel is scarce. It is a more legitimate object of research 
than one half of the new projects daily brought forward. 

The mode adopted by Watt for supplying water to his boilers by means 
of a, float attached to a lever, and so arranged as to open and close a valve 
in an adjoining cistern, was not invented by him. It was employed by 
Mr. Trievvald, the Swedish engineer, in 1745, in his apparatus for commu- 
nicating heat to green -houses by steam, and is described, with a figure, in 
the London Magazine for 1755, p. 18 — 21. 

Heating green-houses by steam is mentioned by an English writer in 
1660. Rivius, in 1548, speaks of eolipiles being employed to impart an 
agreeable temperature to apartments in dwellings. Col. Wm. Cook's 
" Method to warm rooms by the steam of boiling water," is described, 
with a cut, in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1747, p. 171. A boiler was 
to be heated by the kitchen fire, and the steam pipe to ascend through one 
tier of rooms, and descend through another, traversing backwards and 
forwards in each room according to the temperature required ; the escape 
of the condensed and waste steam being regulated by a cock. 

A patent for cooking by steam was taken out in England by Mr. How- 
ard in 1793. He named his apparatus "a pneumatic kitchen." Repertory 
of Arts, vol. x, 147. 

There are two other classes of motive machines that we intended here 
to notice in some detail ; but as they have not come into general use, and 
this volume having already nearly reached its prescribed limits, a brief 
sketch may suffice. The origin of most of them may be traced to attempts 
to supersede steam by more portable fluids, or such as require less fuel to 
generate. We allude to explosive and to vapor engines. Of all the devices 
to which the steam-engine has given birth, none possess greater interest 
than these. Some were designed to raise water directly, and all of them 
indirectly. The first class are named from the force by which they act 
being developed by the firing (generally under pistons) of explosive com- 
pounds. These are either concrete or aeriform substances, as gunpowder, 
a mixture of hydrogen gas and common air, &c. Those of the second 
class are similar to steam-engines, except that they are worked by elastic 
fluids evolved from volatile liquids, or such as pass easily and at low tem- 
peratures into the aeriform state, as alcohol, ether, &c. 

Explosive like steam engines have been made to act in two different 
ways, according to two opposite properties or effects of the exploded sub- 
stance — the expansive force developed, and the vacuum or partial vacuum 
which succeeds. For the purpose of explanation, suppose two large re- 
peating guns or muskets, provided with small charges of powder only, to 
be secured by a frame in a perpendicular position, with their muzzles up- 
wards, and three or four feet apart. Directly over them let there be 
adapted a working beam, somewhat as in the last figure, suspended on a 
fulcrum at an equal distance from each. Suppose the ramrods placed in 
the barrels with their buttons or plugs so made as to fill the bore, and 
work air-tight like the piston of a syringe or pump. Let the upper ends 
of these rods then be connected by a bolt to the ends of the beam, which 
should be at such a distance above the muzzles that when the plug of one 
rod is at the bottom of its barrel, that of the other may be just within the 



472 Gunpowder and Vapor Engines. [Book IV. 

muzzle of the other barrel. Now let that musket with whose breech the 
plug of its ramrod is in contact be first fired, and the rod will instantly be 
forced like a bullet up the barrel, and by its connection with the beam 
will cause the other rod to descend. The musket in which this last rod 
moves is then in its turn to be fired and the rod forced up in the same way. 
Thus the operation is continued. The reciprocating motion of the beam 
is converted, if required, into a continuous rotary one by means of a crank 
or some analogous device. 

Engines on this plan have not succeeded, nor is there any probability 
of their success. There are apparently insuperable objections to them, 
but which need not here be detailed. The explosion of gunpowder has 
therefore been more frequently employed to produce a partial vacuum in 
a cylinder when its piston is raised, in order to excite the pressure of the 
atmosphere to force it down. Suppose one or more openings, covered by 
valves or flaps, were made near the upper ends of the muskets mentioned 
above, i. e. just beneath the pistons or plugs of the ramrods when at the 
highest point in the barrels, and the powder exploded when they are in 
that position : the sudden expansion would drive out through the valves 
most of the air previously in the barrel, the valves would instantly close, 
and the atmosphere would push down the rod and thus raise the other ; 
which in its turn might be caused to descend by exploding the charge 
under it, and so on continually. Instead of openings in the cylinders for 
the escape of the air, some experimenters have made large openings in 
the pistons and covered them with flaps, (like the suckers of common 
pumps) so that when the explosion ceased the flaps closed and prevented 
the air's return. Others have used solid pistons and removed the bottoms 
of their cylinders, and covered the openings with leather flaps so as to 
operate as valves and give a freer exit to the air and heated gases. This 
was the plan adopted by Mr. Morey. Papin used hollow pistons. The 
vacuum produced in this manner by gunpowder has always been very 
imperfect. Instead of obtaining a pressure of 14 or 15 pounds on the inch, 
Papin could not realize more than six or seven. 

Gunpowder has also been applied to raise water directly, by exploding 
it in close vessels like the receivers of Savery, with a view to expel their 
contents by its expansive force, and also to produce a vacuum in order to 
charge them — but with no useful result. 

Explosive mixtures, formed of certain proportions of an inflammable 
gas and common air, have been found to produce a better vacuum than 
gunpowder ; for a volume of air equal to that of the gas used is displaced 
from the cylinder by the entrance of the gas previous to every explosion, 
and when this takes place nearly the whole of the remaining air is expelled. 
As yet, however, the best of explosive engines have had but an ephemeral 
existence. Besides other disadvantages, the heat generated by the flame 
attending the explosion expands the air that remains, so as to diminish 
considerably the effect. 

Of vapor engines, the most promising at one time were those in which 
the moving force was derived from ether and alcohol. The former boils 
at about blood heat, or 98° of Fahrenheit's scale, and the latter at 174°, 
while water requires 212°. The vapor of alcohol, it has been stated, 
exerts double the force of steam at the same temperature ; and if to this it 
be conceded that the same quantity of fuel produces equal temperatures 
on both alcohol and water, then the former would seem to be more econo- 
mical than than the latter. Moreover, in consequence of the different spe- 
cific gravities of water, alcohol and ether, the cost of vaporizing equal 
volumes of each varies in a still greater ratio than their boiling points — 



Chap. 9] Vapor Engines — Woisard's Machine. 473 

this cost being as the numbers 11, 4, 2 — thus making the scale preponde- 
rate still more in favor of alcohol and ether. Why then, it may be asked t 
have they not superseded water ] Principally because the different vo- 
lumes of vapor from equal quantities of the three liquids turn back the 
scale in favor of steam. A cubic inch of water affords 1800 cubic inches 
of steam, while a cubic inch of alcohol produces about 600 and ether only 
300 inches; hence the expense of producing equal volumes of vapor (and 
that is the main point) is actually in favor of steam. It has therefore been 
deemed more economical to use this fluid than the others, even if they 
were equally cheap — to say nothing of the danger arising from such an 
employment of highly inflammable liquids, and the practical difficulties 
attending their application. 

In 1791, Mr. John Barber obtained a patent for an explosive motive 
engine : he used gas or vapor from " coal, wood, oil, or any other com- 
bustible matter," which he distilled in a retort, and " mixed with a proper 
quantity of atmospheric or common air." See Repertory of Arts, vol. viii, 
371. Another patent was issued in 1794 to Robert Street, for an " in- 
flammable vapor force," or explosive engine. He exploded spirits of 
tar or turpentine mixed with common air under a piston, and forced it 
entirely out of the cylinder, into which it was again returned (by its own 
weight) and guided by grooves in the frame work. Repertory of Arts, 
vol. i, 154. In 1807, a patent was granted in France to M. De Rivaz, for 
another, in which hydrogen and common air were mixed and exploded. 
De Rivaz moved a locomotive carriage by the power he thus derived. 
He also inflamed the gaseous mixture by the electric spark. Dr. Jones, 
in 1814, made experiments on another. See Journal of the Franklin In- 
stitute, vol. i, 2d series, page 18. Mr. Cecil, in 1820, published in the 
Transactions of the Cambridge Philosophical Society, (Eng.) a description 
of an explosive engine of considerable merit. 

In 1825, Mr. Brown, of London, patented his pneumatic or gas vacuum 
engine. The very sanguine expectations it excited have now died away. 
It is figured and described in too many works, both English and Ameri- 
can, to require insertion here. In 1826, Mr. Morey, of New Hampshire, 
patented an explosive engine, and soon after exhibited a large working 
model in this city, (New York) which we took several opportunities to 
examine. The piston rods of two vertical and open cylinders were con- 
nected to the opposite ends of a vibrating beam. The pistons were made 
of sheet copper, in the form of plungers, about nine inches diameter, and 
were made to work air-tight by means of a strip of oiled listing or cloth 
tied round the upper ends of the cylinders. This was all the packing. 
Mr. Morey employed the vapor of spirits of turpentine and common air. 
A small tin dish contained the spirits, and the only heat he used was from 
a common table lamp. By means of a crank and fly-wheel a rotary move- 
ment was obtained, as in the steam-engine. 

A singular device for making the atmospheric changes of temperature 
a means for raising water, was devised by M. Woisard. It consisted of 
two vessels, one above the other, connected by a tube. The lower one, 
having a valve in its bottom, was placed in the water to be raised. The 
upper vessel was exposed to the sun's heat, and within it was a bag or 
small balloon containing air, and a little ether, or other volatile liquid. 
" As the atmospheric temperature falls, the balloon will diminish in bulk, 
the surrounding air will become rarer, and the water will introduce itself 
into the machine through the valve ; and when the temperature again 
rises, the pressure exerted within the machine by the increasing volume 
of the baPoon, will cause the excess of water to flow out." With the ex- 

60 



474 Decomposition and recomposition of Water. [Book IV, 

ception of the ether, this device is a modification of the air machines Nos. 
174 and 175, figured at page 380. 

The vapor of mercury has been tried as a substitute for steam, but 
without much success. This metal boils at 660°. 

Another source of power has been sought in the tremendous force with 
which the liquefied and solidified gases expand at common temperatures. 
Liquid carbonic acid, at the low temperature of 32°, has been found to 
exert a force equivalent to thirty five atmospheres ! and every increment 
of heat adds to its energy. No very practical mode of employing this 
force as a mechanical agent has yet been matured. 

The alternate decomposition and recomposition of water has also been 
suggested. By decomposing this liquid by galvanic electricity, oxygen 
and hydrogen gases are produced in the exact proportions in which they 
combine in water. If these gases be made to occupy the interior of a 
cylinder when the piston is raised, and the electric spark be then passed 
through them, they instantly become condensed into a few drops of water, 
and an almost perfect vacuum is the result, when the atmosphere acts on 
the piston. The water is then to be reconverted into its constituent gases, 
and the operation repeated. See " The Chemist," for 1825. For further 
and more recent information respecting motive engines, consult the Re- 
pertory of Arts, Hebert's Register of Arts, London Mechanics' Magazine, 
and the Journal of the Franklin Institute. 



END OP THE FOURTH BOOK. 



BOOK V. 



NOVEL DEVICES FOR RAISING WATER, WITH AN ACCOUNT OP 
SIPHONS, COCKS, VALVES, CLEPSYDRAE, &c. &c. 



CHAPTER I 



SuDJects treated in the fifth book — Lateral communication of motion — This observed by the ancients- 
Wind at the Falls of Niagara — The trombe described — Natural trombes — Tasting hot liquids — Water- 
spouts — Various operations of the human mouth — Currents of water — Gulf stream — Large rivers — Ad- 
ventures of a bottle — Experiments of Venturi — Expenditure of water from various formed ajutages — 
Contracted vein — Cause of increased discharge from conical tubes — Sale of a water power — Regulation 
of the ancient Romans to prevent an excess of water from being drawn by pipes from the aqueducts. 

In this book we propose to notice some devices for raising water that 
are either practically useful, or interesting from their novelty or the prin- 
ciples upon which they act. An account of siphons is added, and also 
remarks on cocks, pipes, valves, and other devices connected with practical 
hydraulics. 

A fluid moving in contact with another that is comparatively at rest, 
drags along those particles which it touches, and these by their mutual 
adhesion carry their neighbors with them ; the latter also communicate 
the impulse to others, and these to more distant ones, until a large mass 
of the fluid on both sides of the motive current is put in motion. Whatever 
may be the process by which this is effected, or by whatever name the 
principle involved may be called, (lateral communication of motion or any 
other) there is no question of the fact. The operation moreover is not 
confined to any particular fluid, nor is it necessary that the one moved 
should be of the same nature as the mover : thus air in motion moves 
water and other liquids as well as air, and aqueous currents impart motion 
to aeriform fluids as well as to standing waters. A stream of wind from 
a bellows bears with it the atmospheric particles which it touches in its 
passage to the fire — i. e. it sweeps along with it the lining of the aerial 
tube through which it is urged. Blowing on a letter sheet to dry the ink, 
or on scalding food to cool it, brings in contact with these substances 
streams of other air than what issues from the thorax. a The operations 
by which the man in the fable blew hot and cold " out of the same mouth " 

a Does not the same principle perform an important part in respiration 1 — the lungs 
not being wholly inflated by air directly in front of the lips, where particles of that 
previously exhaled might still linger, but also by currents flowing in from all sides of 
the mouth or nostrils. 



476 



The Trombe. 



[Book V. 



may here be explained : in the first case the hollow hands closely encom- 
passed the mouth and received the warm air from his chest ; in the latter, 
his food was at a distance from his lips, and consequently the heat of his 
breath was absorbed by the surrounding air and that which was carried 
along with it to his soup. 

A blast of wind directed over the surface of a placid pond or lake not 
only creates a current on the latter, but sometimes bears away part of the 
water with it. A vessel sailing before the wind is aided in her course, 
though it may be but slightly, by the liquid current produced on the 
ocean's surface. Storms of wind long continued heap up the sea against 
the mouths of rivers, and cause them to overflow their banks, while low 
tides often result from the same agent driving the ocean away in opposite 
directions. These effects of wind were observed in remote ages. " He 
raiseth the stormy wind which lifteth up the waves." The river Jordan 
was " driven back " by wind, so that " all the Israelites passed over on dry 
ground." By its agency, a passage for the same people was opened 
through the Red Sea. "And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, 
and the Lord caused the sea to go back, by a strong east wind all that 
night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided." Exodus 
xiv. 21. 

On the other hand, rivers and water-falls bear down immense quantities 
of air with them. Strata of this fluid on the surfaces of rapid streams ac- 
quire a velocity equal to that of the latter, and in some places aerial cur- 
rents thus produced are very sensible. At Niagara they are sufficient to 
drive mills or supply blasts for a long line of forges. In 1829, while as- 
cending the path on the Canadian side, in order to pass under the grand 
chute, we entered suddenly into one of those invisible currents under the 
Table Rock, and were nearly prostrated by it. It is the ascent of this air 
loaded with minute particles of water, (which are borne up by it in the 
same manner that it is itself carried down) that contributes to the forma- 
tion of the solar and lunar rainbows seen at the great North American and 
other cataracts. Heavy rains bring down oceans of air, an*d in the shower 
bellows, or trombe, blasts of wind are produced on the same principle. 
Could we see the air brought down by heavy showers, we should behold 
it rebounding from the earth, something like smoke when driven against 
a wall or any other plane surface. 

As the trombe illustrates this part of our subject, 
a figure of one may as well be given. The pipe A 
discharges water from a reservoir into a funnel placed 
on the vertical tube C. The end of A terminates 
in the funnel, and opposite to it is made a number 
of openings in C, two of which are shown in the cut. 
The lower end of C enters the close vessel D, and 
discharges its contents on a stone placed directly 
under it. As the water from A passes down C, it 
draws air along with it through the top of the funnel, 
and also through the holes in the upper part of C. 
As the liquid dashes against the stone, the air sepa- 
rates and rises to the top of the vessel, whence it is 
forced by successive volumes through B to the fire, 
while the water collects at the bottom and is let off 
by a regulating valve or cock. This machine it will 
be perceived is a miniature imitation of some of na- 
ture's operations ; for cascades, water-falls, and also 
No. 198. The Trombe. heavy showers of rain, are all natural trombes. 




Chap. 1.] Gulf Stream. 477 

The trombe is of considerable antiquity. It was known to Heron, and 
is referred to in Pliny's Natural History. Kircher has given several figures 
of it. See torn, i, 203, of his Mundus Subterraneus, and torn, ii, pp. 310. 
347, of his Musurgia Universalis ; in which last work he shows its appli- 
cation to supply wind to organs, and by discharging the water from the 
bottom of the vessel upon a wheel he imparted motion to the keys of those 
instruments. See also Phil. Trans. Abridg. vol. i, 498. 

Liquids raised by currents of air may be illustrated by operations in 
common life. Whenever water in a well settles to a level with the orifice 
of the pump pipe, air rushes in (on the ascent of the sucker) and sweeps 
up with it portions of the liquid in the form of dense rain. On the same 
principle people are enabled to taste scalding liquids. The next time the 
reader sips hot soup, or tea, or coffee, he will find himself involuntarily 
keeping the edge or rim of the spoon or vessel a short distance from his 
mouth, and protruding his lips till the upper one projects a little over the 
edge : then drawing in his breath, the entering air ripples the surface of 
the liquid, and by its velocity bears broken portions along, precisely like 
the pump just mentioned. The liquid particles being thus mixed with 
comparatively large volumes of cool air, are so reduced in their tempera- 
ture as to be received without injury and without inconvenience. 8 

Water-spouts appear to be charged in much the same way, whatever 
may be the active agent in the formation of these singular phenomena ; for 
the sea immediately under their orifice has often been observed to bubble 
or boil violently, and rise into the spout in disjointed masses. 

A stream of water directed into or through a body of the same liquid, 
also communicates motion to those particles of the latter that are in contact 
with or adjacent to the current. Examples of this are furnished in several 
of nature's hydraulic operations. That constant oceanic current produced 
by the trade winds is one. It sweeps round the globe, but is deflected 
and divided by the varying configuration of the lands that lie in its way. 
Under the torrid zone, it passses through the Pacific and Indian oceans, 
whirls round the southern point of Africa, inclines to that continent in 
again approaching the equator, then stretching across the Atlantic is di- 
vided by the South American coast — one part turning northward to the 
Gulf of Mexico — thence this last division issues as the Gulf Stream, and 
being turned in an easterly direction by the coast of the United States, it 
bears away past the banks of Newfoundland, and extends its influence to 
Ireland, Iceland, Norway and the North Sea. This mighty current not 
only draws with it the liquid channel through which it flows, but the ocean 
for leagues on each side is carried along with it, or follows in its train ; 

a Some of the operations of the mouth are deserving of particular notice. They will 
be found to elucidate several philosophical principles, and attention to them would cer- 
tainly have enabled inventors to have anticipated many useful discoveries. We have 
in a preceding book observed that the mouth is often employed as a forcing pump in 
ejecting liquids, and as a sucking one when drawing them through siphons, or through 
simple tubes. We have just seen how it raises hot liquids by drawing a stream of air 
over them, and machines on the same principle have been made to raise water. It is 
often used as a bellows to kindle fires, and every body employs it to cool hot victuals 
by blowing. It even acts as a stove to warm our frozen fingers, by giving out heated 
air. Many make a condensing air-pump of it, to fill bladders, air-beds and air-pillows ; 
some make an exhausting one of it, and in all it acts continually as both in respiration. 
How often does it perform the part of a fife, an organ, or a whistle, to produce music ? 
— of an air-gun to shoot bullets and arrows from the sarbacan ? — and, not to weary the 
reader, when employed in smoking a pipe of tobacco, we see in operation the identical 
principle of increasing the draft of locomotive chimneys by exhaustion — i. e. a sucking 
apparatus is applied to that extremity of the flue that is the farthest from the fire — a device 
patented in Europe a few years ago. 



473 



Water raised, by currents of the same liquid. 



[Book V. 



and thus it is incessantly transferring to northern latitudes the warm waters 
of the equinoctial regions.* 

The volumes of water which shoot from the mouths of the Amazon, 
Oronoco and Mississippi, continue with almost unabated velocity for leagues 
into the sea, and impart motion to the contiguous portions of the latter, 
which are compelled to accompany them in their course. 

A current of water not only imparts motion in this manner to a mass of 
the same liquid when on a level with itself, but it may be applied to raise 
water from a lower level. This at first sight does not appear very obvious. 
A person having a field which he is unable to drain for want of a place 
of discharge sufficiently low for the purpose, would hardly think his object 
could be obtained by passing a rapid stream into it from a higher level. 
To some farmers this would seem the most direct way to deluge the land; 
yet the thing is not only possible, but in some cases quite easy, as will 
appear from the following experiments made by M. Venturi in 1797. 

From the lower part of the cistern D, No. 199, a horizontal tube pro- 
ceeded into the vessel A C. The water in D was kept at 32J inches 
above the centre of the pipe. Opposite and at a short distance from the 
pipe was placed the mouth of an inclined rectangular channel or gutter, 
open at top. The water issuing from the pipe rushed up this channel, and 
was discharged at B ; but as it entered the gutter, the current dragged in 
with it the contents of A C, until the surface sunk from A to C. From 
this experiment it is obvious that land on a low level, as at C, might be 
drained in this manner, and the water discharged above, as at B, where- 
ever a motive current could be obtained. Venturi applied the principle 
with success to some marshy land belonging to the public. 

In the next experiment both air and water are moved by the current, 
and the pressure of the atmosphere excited to raise water as in the pipe 

of a pump. The cylindri- 
cal tube K (No. 200) was 
connected to a reservoir 
of water, D, the surface 
as before being 32^ inches 
above its orifice. The pipe 
K was 18 lines in diameter 
and 57 long. A glass tube 
A B was connected to its 
upper surface at the dis- 
tance of eight lines from 
its junction with the reser- 
voir. The other end of 
the glass tube descended 
When water flowed through 




No. 199. 



into a vessel, T, containing a colored liquid. 



a Floating substances have often been thrown into the Gulf Stream to ascertain its 
direction. Upwards of twenty years ago we cast overboard, near the Banks, a common 
quart bottle carefully corked and sealed, and having a few inches of red bunting tied to 
the neck. The bottle contained a letter addressed to a gentleman in London, and an 
open note in English and French, requesting the finder to put the letter into the nearest 
post-office, American or European, and also a memorandum of the circumstances, date 
and place of its discovery. Precisely eleven months from the day the bottle was com- 
mitted to the deep, the letter was delivered by the postman, and accompanied with an- 
other from an Irish clergyman. The fragile vessel floated safely ashore near Sligo. Its 
little pennon excited the attention of a peasant, who broke the bottle, and not knowing 
what to make of the contents, carried the whole to his priest. This gentleman politely 
forwarded the letter to its destination, and wrote another containing the particulars just 
mentioned. Both letters, we believe, were laid before the British Admiralty by the gen- 
tleman to whom they were addressed. 



Chap. l.J 



Vacuum produced by liquid currents. 



479 



K it dragged the air at the mouth of the glass tube with it, the remaining 
air dilated, and finally the whole was carried out with the effluent water, 
and the colored liquid rose to the height of 24 inches in A B. The glass 
tube was then shortened to about 22 inches, when the contents of T rose 
up and were discharged from K. In another experiment K was placed 
in nearly a perpendicular position, being inclined a little that the jet % might 
not fall back on itself, but the liquid rose through A B as before. The 
end of A B where it joined K was flush with the interior surface of the 
latter. Several small holes were made round K ; these diminished the 
velocity of the issuing current, but no water escaped through the openings. 

There is a singular fact relating to the discharge of liquids from different 
shaped ajutages : for example, more water flows through a short tube than 
through a simple orifice of the same diameter. A circular opening, of the 
same diameter as the bore of K in the last figure, was made in a sheet of 
tin, and the latter attached to a cistern in which the water was kept at a 
constant altitude of 32^ inches : now while four cubic feet of water escaped 
through the opening in 41 seconds, an equal quantity passed through K in 
31 seconds ; and when the length of K was only twice its diameter, the 
quantity discharged was still greater. 

But the quantity discharged may be still further increased if the end of 
K next the reservoir be made to assume the form of the contracted vein. 
This term is used to designate that contraction which a liquid column un- 
dergoes when escaping through an orifice, or when entering a tube. Sup- 
pose an aperture, an inch in diameter, made in the bottom of a bucket or 
a cauldron, and closed by a plug. Then fill the vessel with water, and 
withdraw the plug. Upon examination the descending column will be 
found contracted or tapered for a short distance below the orifice, viz. 
half an inch, or half the diameter of the orifice. The area of the section 
of the smallest or most contracted part will be to the orifice as 10 to IP 
according to Bossut, but when a short cylindrical tube was applied to the 
orifice, he found the contraction as 10 to 12.3. (The same thing occurs 
whether the opening be made in the side or bottom of a vessel.) Hence 
by enlarging the end of K next the reservoir, in the proportions named, 
the contraction within the cylindrical part of the tube would be avoided, 
and the discharge consequently increased. 




No. 201. 



No. 202. 



By substituting for K a compound tube of the form and proportions 
figured at No. 201, the quantity discharged has been ascertained to be 
more than doubled, being to that delivered by the orifice in the tin plate 
as 24 to 10 ! A, the cistern ; B, a short conical tube connecting the cylin 



4S0 Discharge of Liquids through Conical Ajutages. [Book V. 

drical one to the conical frustrum C D. Supposing the diameter of C 
to be unity or 1, that of D should be 1.8, and the distance between them 
9. The increased discharge ceases when the cylindrical part of the tube 
B C is of considerable length, and of the same bore as the smaller end 
of C D. 

A tube of the form represented at No. 202 was applied by Venturi to 
the same reservoir, the depth of water in which was also kept at 32J 
inches. Three glass tubes, ABC, were connected to the under side of 
the pipe, and their lower ends inserted into a vessel containing mercury. 
When water flowed through the pipe the mercury rose 53 lines in A, 20 
in B, and 7 in C. These quantities correspond with 62 inches of water 
in A, 24 inches in B, and 8 in C. The length of the pipe should not ex- 
ceed four times the diameter of its smaller end., and its sides should not 
diverge from each other more than what is required to form an angle of 
from three to four degrees. By this principle it will be perceived, that 
water may also be raised from a lower level and discharged at an upper 
one, and in many situations it might doubtless be adopted with advantage. 
See Nicholson's Journal, vol. ii, and Hachette's Traite Elementaire des 
Machines. 

Different causes have been assigned for the increased discharge of 
liquids through conical tubes. One is certainly to be found in the material 
of which they are made ; for when formed of or lined with any substance 
that repels or refuses to coalesce or be wetted with the effluent water, as 
wax, tallow, &c. the effect ceases. The phenomenon therefore depends 
upon the attraction and adhesion of the liquid to the sides of the tubes, 
which sides exert a capillary force in drawing the particles of the liquid 
towards them, so as not only to prevent its assuming the figure of the con- 
tracted vein when entering the tube No. 202, but also drawing the particles 
to the diverging sides of the discharging ajutage. 

A knowledge of the increased discharge of liquids from conical tubes 
has led some persons to take advantage of the fact, to the serious injury 
of others. We have heard of the purchaser of a water power, who ac- 
cording to the covenant was to connect his mill-race with the dam by a 
trunk of a certain specified bore at the junction. This he did, but making 
the sides of the trunk diverge as in the last figure, the proprietor of 
the dam was astounded to find the water, as if moved by instinct, giving 
the new channel the preference, and unaccountably persisting in rushing 
through it with a velocity that threatened to drain the well supplied reser- 
voir, and leave his own mill to take its rest. This increased discharge is 
not confined to tubes of a cylindrical or conical form. The walls of the 
channel may be straight, and its section may be a square, a triangle, &c. 
as well as a circle. 

There is some reason for believing that overreaching in this way is not 
wholly a modern discovery. No city, ancient or modern, was perhaps 
ever supplied with water in greater profusion than old Rome ; yet the con- 
tents of her aqueducts were meted out with economy, and, as in modern 
times, a revenue was derived from the sale of the water. The superin- 
tendence of the aqueducts and of the distribution of the liquid through the 
streets and houses were always intrusted to a citizen of rank and talents. 
The celebrated Frontinus held the office under Nerva, by whose directions 
he wrote two books on the water- works of Rome, the times of their erec- 
tion, districts of the city supplied by each, the number of public and pri- 
vate fountains, quantities of water discharged from different sized orifices, 
&c. From him we learn that numerous frauds were practiced in obtaining 
more than the assigned quantity of the liquid, one of the means for pre- 



Chap. 2.] Water raised by Currents of Air. 481 

venting which was this : when a pipe for the supply of a house was to be 
connected to the castellum or reservoir, (which received the water from 
one of the aqueducts) a brass calix, or short bent tube, (probably the same 
as the modern ones which connect the lateral pipes to the mains) was de- 
livered by the officer in charge to the workmen, to insert into the castellum ; 
and it was enacted that the bore of the cylindrical leaden pipe should l be 
the same as that of the calix for at least fifty feet from the castellum. It 
is therefore pretty clear that Roman engineers were aware, that the in- 
creased discharge through enlarged orifices ceases when a considerable 
length of pipe of the same bore as the calix intervened. 



CHAPTER II 



Water raised by currents of air — Fall of the barometer during storms— Hurricanes commence at the 
leeward — Damage done by storms not always by the impulse of the wind — Vacuum produced by storma 
of wind— Draft of chimneys — Currents of wind in houses — Fire grates and parabolic jambs — Experi- 
ments with a sheet of paper — Experiments with currents of air through tubes variously connected — 
Effect of conical ajutages to blowing tubes — Application of these tubes to increase the draft of chimneys 
and to ventilate wells, mines and ships. 



Currents of air and other elastic fluids may be employed to raise water 
in a manner different from any yet noticed ; i. e. not by any modification 
of the lateral communication of motion, nor by breaking the liquid into 
minute particles by the motive fluid mixing with them, but by the removal 
or diminution of atmospheric pressure. The principle to which we allude 
is to be found more or less active in nature, and illustrations of it are not 
infrequent in common life, although for want of reflection they are seldom 
noticed and are not always understood. 

Meteorologists have long observed that storms of wind are accompanied 
with a diminution of the air's pressure, and that the descent of the mercu- 
rial column in the barometer keeps pace generally with the violencs of 
the tempest : thus in hurricanes the depression is much more than during 
ordinary gales, while in the vortex of a tornado or a whirlwind it is 
excessive. 

Some persons are apt to consider winds as proceeding directly from the 
power that generates them, as a stream of water proceeds from a fire- 
engine or one of air from a bellows, whereas they as often rush towards 
the source that gives them birth ; and hence it is that hurricanes, some- 
times if not always, commence at the leeward. Should any mystery ap- 
pear in this it is easily explained : — if a person blow through a tube, the 
blast proceeds from him ; if he suck air through it, the current is directed 
to him : when we close a pair of bellows, wind issues from the nozzle ; if 
they are opened while the valve in the lower board is shut, it rushes back 
through the same channel : so it is with currents in the atmosphere. A 
partial void is formed in the upper regions, perhaps by electricity, by 
changes of temperature or humidity, by rarefaction or other causes, and 

61 



482 Removal of Atmospheric Pressure by Currents of Air. [Book V. 

instantly oceans of the fluid matter around rush to restore the equilibrium: 
then the removal of these oceans necessarily induces others to move also 
to take their place, and in this way various strata of the atmosphere, for 
miles and hundreds of miles, are put in motion towards the place where 
the cause of their movements is located, and in a way not unlike that by 
which streams of air enter a person's mouth while he sucks an empty tube, 
or a bellows during the act of opening them. 

When the lowering sky and flitting clouds announce the approach of a 
violent storm, and when, like a demon broke loose, it destroys in its fury 
nearly every thing in its track, we commonly suppose the mischief is done 
by the direct impulse of the blast — that agitated and groaning forests, trees 
prostrated, walls and fences leveled, buildings o'erturned and others un- 
roofed, &c. are the results of a tempest sweeping these objects before it, 
somewhat as we blow dust &c. from a table or from the cover or edge of 
a book. But this, though sometimes the case, is not always so ; for if it 
were, almost every object blown down by the wind would be found lying 
in the direction of the blast, whereas they are frequently discovered in the 
opposite one. The effects enumerated are sometimes caused by winds 
blowing over a district of country without coming in contact with the earth 
or the objects upon it, but merely sweeping at some distance above them: 
at other times similar results are met with at the extreme edge of a storm, 
and even beyond it. In these cases a partial vacuum produced by the 
aerial currents often works all the mischief, although it may be, as it fre- 
quently is, but of momentary duration. Close buildings have been instan- 
taneously destroyed by the expansion of the air within them, their walls 
being thrown outivards, and their roofs projected aloft. The tornado by 
which the city of Natchez was recently destroyed furnished striking proofs 
of this removal of atmospheric pressure, and of fearful damages occasioned 
by the void. The doors and windows of one or two houses left standing 
amid the general wreck happened to be open, and thus furnished avenues 
for the dilated air to escape. In some houses the leeward gable ends 
were pushed out, and the windward ones stood ; in others, the leeward 
walls remained standing while those to the windward were thrown out- 
wards in the face of the storm. Both gable ends were burst out in some, 
and of others the sudden expansion of the air raised the roofs for a pas- 
sage, and left more or less of the walls standing.* 

Persons whose ideas of a vacuum are inseparably associated with air- 
tight vessels, would hardly suppose that any thing approaching to one 
could be formed in the open regions above and about us ; yet every breath 
of wind — the gentle zephyr as well as the furious tempest — destroys the 
equilibrium of the air's pressure, and consequently produces a partial void ; 
and it will be seen in this and the following chapter that a vacuum may 
be produced and maintained in open tubes. It should however be kept in 
mind, that an absolute vacuity is not found in nature nor to be obtained by 
art : the slightest rarefaction and the best results of the best air-pump are 
but degrees in the range of a scale, of whose limits we know but little. 

A few more familiar illustrations of the removal or diminution of atmos- 
pheric pressure by currents of air will not be out of place. And first, who 
has not, while sitting by a winter's fire, witnessed the coals in the grate 
brighten suddenly up, and heard the flames and heated air roar in the 
chimney as if urged for a few moments by some invisible bellows-blower? 
— phenomena attributed, we believe, in the days of witchcraft, to elves and 

a See an interesting account of this tornado by Dr. Tooley, of Natchez, in the Journal 
of the Franklin Institute for June, 1840. 



Chap. 2.] Experiments with a Sheet of Paper. 483 

fairies, those mischievous imps who, in their wayward moods, sometimes 
undertook to blow the fires as well as to sweep and sand the floors of the 
houses they visited, and who, by their screams of delight on leaving their 
work, were supposed to produce the hollow sounds in the flue as they 
darted up to join their comrades in the tempest without ! It need hardly 
be observed that it is gusts of wind, sweeping in particular directions over 
the tops of chimneys, and thereby causing a partial vacuum within them, 
that thus powerfully increases the draft. But it is not necessary to have 
fire in the grate, for the effect may be noticed in parlors during the summer 
months, when those light and ornamental paper aprons with which ladies 
cover the fronts of their grates are often thus drawn into the flues, and be- 
come disfigured and spoiled. 

Other examples may be derived from the movements of interior doors, 
blinds and curtains of windows, &c. "While we are writing, the front 
door of our dwelling is opened, which affords a clear passage from the 
street to a garden in the rear. The door of the room we occupy opens 
into the passage, through which a flaw of wind has just passed, and in a 
twinkling the blinds swing from the windows, and the door is slammed to 
its frame, by the air in the room rushing to join the passing current, or to 
iill the slight vacuum produced by it. An open fire-place creates a draft 
up the chimney, which acts as a pump to draw cold air into the room ; 
hence the complaint, not at all uncommon, of being roasted in front while 
facing the fire, and at the same time experiencing the unmitigated rigors 
of winter behind. (In such cases the combustion should be supported by 
air drawn from without by a pipe terminating beneath the grate — a device 
patented in modern days, though it was known two centuries ago, and is 
described by M. Gauger in his treatise on " Fires Improved," a work 
translated by Desaguliers in 1715*) The motion of every object in nature 
produces currents of air, and in every possible direction — the movement 
of the hand in writing or sewing — the trembling of a leaf or of an earth- 
quake — the flight of an eagle or of an insect — the ball whizzing from a 
cannon's mouth, the creeping of a snail, or a wasp using her forceps. 

Artificial illustrations might be quoted without end. Lay two books of 
the same size, or two pieces of board, six or eight inches apart upon a 
table, and place a sheet of paper over them ; then blow between the books, 
and the paper, instead of being displaced by the blast, will be pressed 
down to the table by the atmosphere above it, and with a force propor- 
tioned to the intensity of the blast. Instead of the mouth next use a pair 
of bellows, by inserting the nozzle under one edge of the paper, and the 
effect will still be the same. The stream of wind may even be directed 
partly against the under side of the paper, which notwithstanding will re- 
tain its place and be pressed down as before. Suspend the books or fix 
them to the under side of a table, then hold on the paper till the blast is 
applied, when the sheet will be sustained against gravity. Fold the paper 
into a tube and blow through it with the mouth, or with bellow\s — in both 
cases it will be collapsed. From this experiment we learn that the force 
which fluids exert against the sides of pipes that contain them, is greatly 
diminished when they pass rapidly through. We have known a small 
leak in the pipe that supplied steam to a high-pressure engine, cease to 
give out vapor every time the communication was opened to the cylinder 

a " Parabolical jambs" (also patented) or backs of grates for reflecting from their po- 
lished surfaces the heat into the room, are described in the same interesting little work. 
At page 140 Desaguliers speaks of bellows invented and patented by Captain Savery — 
a device of his that is no where else mentioned that we are aware of. 



484 



Experiments with 



[BwkV. 



—the particles oi* the fluid then being hurried along with a velocity too 
great to allow any of them to change their direction to escape at the leak. 
The following abstract of experiments made by us in 1834-5, to illus- 
trate the same principle, may interest some readers : — To ascertain the 
extent to which atmospheric pressure was removed from under the sheet 
of paper, we bent a small glass tube at right angles, and placing one end 
under the paper let it rest on the table, while the other descended into a 
tumbler containing a little water. Then taking a small pair of bellows, 
and directing the blast over the pipe, the water rose from one half to three 
fourths of an inch. The books upon which the sheet laid were then placed 
within two inches of each other, when the effect was increased, the liquid 
rising from lj to 2 inches. We next laid aside the paper and made use 
of two tubes, one to blow through and the other to measure the ascent of 
the liquid. 



4\h a 






B 



No. 203. No. 204. 



No. 205. No. 206. No. 207. No. 208. No. 209. No. 210. 



Two leaden or block tin tubes, straight and polished in the inside, were 
united at right angles. See No. 203. A C the blowing pipe, 8 inches 
long and half-inch bore. B 12 inches long and three-eighths bore. The 
upper end of B was joined flush and smooth with the interior of the other, 
three inches from the end A. Upon applying the mouth to C and blowing 
in the direction C A, indicated by the arrow, instead of the liquid rising 
in B, part of the current from the lungs entered that tube and was forced 
through the water in the tumbler. Various portions of the end A were 
then cut off without changing the result, until half an inch only remained 
in front of the joint, when the air no longer descended, but no rarefaction 
was produced in B. When both tubes were made of the same bore, part 
of the blast descended in B until the whole of A in front of the joint was 
removed. In numerous trials, the water in the lower end of B was de- 
pressed more or less, whether the blast of wind through A was weak or 
strong. (From these experiments we discover the impropriety of placing 
cylindrical tubes on chimney tops at right angles to the draft, and espe- 
cially on locomotive carriages, as was at first proposed. In the Edinburgh 
Encyclopedia, vol. xvii. p. 457, a carriage by Tredgold is described, and 
a figure of it given in plate 511. The chimney is represented with a short 
horizontal tube attached fore and aft to the top, as in No. 203, with a view 
" to assist the draft" by the passage of the air or wind through it. The 
experiments above show that the reverse would have been the case.) 

As part of the air in passing through A, in No. 203, turned off into B, 



Chap. 2.] Blowing Tubes. 485 

the idea occurred that if the junction of B were made to form an acute 
angle with the longer part of A, then the whole of the aerial current might 
possibly pass out at A, since to enter B it would have very nearly to 
reverse its direction. The device figured at No. 204 was made to test this. 
(The part of A in front of the joint was 1 J inches long, which from several 
experiments we thought produced the best effect, when A was half an 
inch in the bore — i. e. the length of this part of the blowing tube was three 
times its diameter.) Upon trial part of the current passed into B and es- 
caped through the liquid, as in the preceding experiment ; and even when 
B was turned up in a vertical direction before entering the water, the same 
effect took place. 

Various modes of uniting the pipes with the view of preventing the 
blast from entering the vertical one were now tried, and to ascertain the 
effects produced a glass tube, three feet long and three-eighths of an inch 
bore, was attached to the vertical or exhausting tube of each. In No. 205 
a portion of B protruded into A, so as to form a partition or partial cover 
to the orifice. Upon blowing through A (in the direction of the arrow) 
the water sprung up B to the height of 12 inches, and in subsequent trials 
varied from 10 to 20 inches, according to the strength of the blast. By 
connecting the glass tube to the blowing end of A and then blowing 
through B, the liquid rose from 8 to 10 inches ; the difference no doubt 
being caused by the current of air having had greater facilities in one 
passage than in the other. 

We next united two tubes at right angles, but instead of making the 
joint flush within as No. 203, the upper end of B was cut obliquely, as 
if to form a mitred or elbow joint. This end was inserted into the under 
side of A, as represented at No. 206, the open part of B facing A. The 
object of this device was to ascertain whether the convex part of the ver- 
tical tube within A would be sufficient to divert the blast from entering B, 
while it swept over the upper edge and passed round each side. Previous 
to connecting the lower end of B with the glass tube we inserted it in 
water, and upon blowing smartly through A, the liquid rose (10 inches) 
and was expelled with the air, forming a dense shower. The glass tube 
was then attached, (by a slip of India rubber) and upon blowing again the 
water rose, on different trials, from twenty to thirty inches. The tube A 
was half-inch bore, and B three-eighths. Various experiments were made 
to determine the best length of that part of A in advance of the joint : the 
result was generally in favor of the extent already mentioned. 

The end of B cut obliquely, as in the preceding experiment, was now 
inserted into A at an acute angle. See No. 207. The ascent of the liquid 
in several trials varied from 20 to 28 inches. A moderate puff raised it 
14 inches, but a strong effort of the lungs was required to elevate it over 
two feet. When the glass tube was connected to A, as in No. 208, and a 
blast directed through B, the highest range of the liquid was nine inches. 

The tubes were next united as in No. 209 ; that is, the axis of the 
part of B which entered A coincided with that of the latter, thus leaving 
an annular space one-eighth of an inch wide for the passage of the blast. 
The effect of this did not differ so much from No. 208 as was expected. 
The rise varied from 20 to 30 inches ; and not more than half the former 
amount was produced by reversing the tubes, as in No. 210. The annular 
passage for the blast in No. 209 was too small, the current was pinched in 
passing, and its velocity consequently diminished. In another tube in 
which the space was enlarged, the water rose six inches higher. 

We next endeavored to ascertain the effects of varying the form of the 
discnarging ends of the blowing tubes, either by adapting additional ones 



486 



Effects of Conical Ajutages, 



[Book V. 



of a tapering form to them, or by enlarging the ends themselves. Of a 
number of experiments, the following will be sufficient for our present 
purpose. In two of the tubes (Nos. 211 and 212) the exhausting pipe did 
not protrude into the blowing one : in No. 213 it did. As it is difficult to 
keep up a strong blast from the lungs through a pipe so large in the bore 
as half an inch, No. 211 was made of quarter-inch tubing, and No. 212 of 
five-sixteenths. The blowing tube of No. 213 was seven-sixteenths, and 
the exhausting one three-sixteenths, and all were made of lead. Besides 
the tubes just named we prepared a dozen conical ones, nine inches long, 
the small ends one-quarter inch bore, and the large ones varying from 
three-fourths to 2 J inches. They were made of tin plate, the seams were 
lapped, and no particular care was taken in their formation. From nu- 
merous trials with them in a variety of ways, we obtained the best results 
with two, one of which was 1 J inches at the large end, and the other seven- 
eighths. But of these the latter, marked C in the cut, generally caused the 
water to rise highest in the exhausting tube. 

The discharging end of No. 211 extended lj inches from the joint, 
and the opposite end 2J inches. When blown 
through in the direction of the arrow, part of 
the current descended through the water, but 
when the conical pipe C was held close to the 
discharging end the liquid rose in the vertical 
pipe 9 J inches. A quarter of an inch was next 
cut off the discharging end and C again ap- 
plied, when the water rose 12 inches. The 
end was next remered out with the tapered 
prong of a file, when the water rose (without 
C) 11 inches. Another portion was next cut 
off, leaving only half an inch in front of the 
joint, and the end swelled out as before, upon 
which the rise was 1\ inches ; but when C 
was applied the water rose 17j- inches. 
In all the trials with C it was necessary, in order to obtain the best 
results, that its axis should coincide with that of the blowing tube ; other- 
wise the current of air is deflected in its passage. The length of the 
blowing end of the tube should be no more than what is necessary to give 
a straight direction to the current. If longer than this, the velocity and 
strength of the blast is unnecessarily diminished by friction against the 
prolonged sides. The blowing tube should also be straight and smooth 
within ; for the energy of the blast is less diminished in passing through a 
straight than through a crooked channel — through a smoothly polished 
tube than through one whose interior is marked with asperities. Moreover, 
dints or bruises in a pipe produce counter currents, and materially diminish 
the ascent of the liquid. In small tubes, the end received into the mouth 
might be enlarged or cut obliquely to facilitate the entrance of the air; 
for if the fluid be retarded in its entrance, part of the force exerted by the 
lungs is uselessly expended. It is immaterial in what position the blowing 
tube is used. 

In No. 212 the blowing tube was jointed to the exhausting one at an angle 
of 20°. The part in advance of the joint was 1 J inches. Upon trial, the liquid 
jose seven inches. The tube D was applied, (its small end being enlarged 
to five-sixteenths) and the water rose nine inches. The tube was then 
swelled out by the prong of a file until its orifice was seven-sixteenths of 
an inch, when the rise was 10J inches. D was then applied, its end en- 
tering the other, and the water rose 13 inches. Previous to this trial D 




No. 211. 



No. 212. No. 213. 



Chap. 2.] When applied to Blowing Tubes. 4S7 

had become slightly bruised in the middle of its length by a fall: the 
bruises were taken out, and the water rose 24 inches. Various portions 
were cut from the large end of D, but no diminution of the rise occurred 
while 3^ inches remained, and this length from several trials gave better 
results than when the tube was made shorter. 

In No. 213, the discharging end of the blowing tube was \\ inches long. 
Without any additional tube, the water rose 16 inches. The end was 
swelled out, and the liquid rose 19 inches. D was applied, and it rose 
29 inches. C was then tried, which made the liquid ascend 31 inches. 
The discharging end was reduced in length from an inch and a half to 
half an inch, and the elevation of the liquid was diminished, both with and 
without the additional tubes C and D. 

Two other tubes connected like No. 213 were also tried. From slight 
variations in the dimensions of the passage way over the end of the ex- 
hausting tube, the results varied. Without the additional tube C, one 
raised the water only seven inches, while with C the rise was 17 inches. 
The other alone raised the liquid 14 inches, and with C 20 J inches. 

It has been seen from preceding experiments, that when two tubes of 
the same bore are united, as in Nos. 203, 204 and 211, part of the current 
from the mouth will descend the vertical one, if but half an inch or even 
less of the discharging end project beyond the joint. To ascertain at what 
distance from the joint this descent of the current could be counteracted 
by additional tubes, we connected two pieces of leaden pipe (A and B) 
five-sixteenths of an inch bore to each other, as in the figure. A was 15 

£ < ^ inches long; B four inches, 

and joined to the other three 
inches from the blowing 
end, thus leaving 12 inches 
in front of the joint. The 
No 214> lower end of B dipped not 

more than one-tenth of an 
inch in water. A tapered pipe, C, whose wide end was \\ inches and 
the small one five-sixteenths was attached to A, and upon blowing through 
A, part of the blast descended through B. Small portions were then suc- 
cessively cut off the discharging end of A, until the air ceased to descend 
in B. When nine inches remained in front of the joint, but a solitary 
bubble or two escaped through the water, and after another inch was re- 
moved, leaving eight inches in front, the whole current from the lungs 
passed through A. The conical tube was nine inches long, and after the 
last result it was divided at D, four inches from the end. Upon removing 
the part thus cut off, air again descended through B. 

From this experiment we see that the influence of such terminations as 
C to cylindrical air tubes, extends to a distance equal to 25 times the tube's 
diameter. It is however modified by the velocity of the motive current. 
When high steam is used instead of air, the distance is greatly diminished, 
and in some cases annihilated. A smoky chimney, or one with a feeble 
draft, may be cured by enlarging its upper part like the additional tube C 
in the last figure. The reason why an equal amount of rise in the exhaust- 
ing tube is not produced by additional ones to such devices as No. 213,. 
arises no doubt from the projection of the exhausting tube into the blowing- 
one, which prevents the blast from sweeping directly into the conical one 
and filing the latter, a condition necessary to the increased ascent. 

Some applications of the principle illustrated by the preceding experi- 
ments may be noticed : — 1. In siphons for decanting corroding or other 
liquids — for which see remarks on these instruments in a subsequent 




488 



Draft of Chimneys — Ventilation of Ships. 



[Book V. 




No. 215. 



chapter. 2. Increasing the draft of chimneys, as well as preventing them 
from smoking. Instead of the old fashioned caps of clay or the moveable 

ones of iron, let them be made in the form of 
the annexed figure, and either of sheet iron or 
copper. A short pipe should be fixed on the 
chimney, and over it an outer one (shown in 
the cut) to turn freely, but as close as possible 
without touching, that the horizontal one to 
which the latter is attached may veer round 
with the wind. The vane V keeps the oppo- 
site end A to the wind, which enters as indi- 
cated by the straight arrow, and. in passing 
through sweeps over the projection and causes 
a vacuum in the chimney, as in the blowing 
tubes already described. 
A device of this kind might be made to act in windy weather as a per- 
petual bellows to blast or refining furnaces, and also to those of steam- 
boats and locomotive carriages. When used on chimneys of the latter, a 
contrivance to turn and keep the blowing tube fore and aft, as the carriage is 
turned, would be required. The joint where the perpendicular tube moves 
over the fixed one might also be made air-tight by an amalgam, on the 
principle of the water lute. From the experiments with the tubes Nos. 
206, "7, '8, '9, '10 and '13, it follows that if the waste steam of a locomo- 
tive carriage were discharged over the mouth of the chimney as above, 
instead of up its centre, the resulting vacuum would be greater. 

It is worth while to try whether wells, mines, and the holds of ships, 
could not be more speedily and effectually ventilated by a similar device 
than by the common wind sails used, in the latter. These displace the 
noxious vapors by mixing fresh air with them, but by the proposed plan 
the foul air might be drawn up alone, while the atmosphere would cause 
a steady and copious supply to stream in at every avenue. 

If two or three exhausting tubes, of metal or of any other suitable ma- 
terial, (whose diameter for a ship of the largest class need not exceed 
three or four inches) were permanently secured in a vessel, their lower 
ends terminating in or communicating with those parts where noxious 
effluvia chiefly accumulates, and the upper ends leading to any convenient 
part of the deck, sides or stern, so that the blowing part could readily be 
slipped tight into or over them, the interior might be almost as well ven- 
tilated, even when the hatches were all down, as the apartments of an 
ordinary dwelling. It appears to us moreover, that a vessel might by this 
means be always kept charged with fresh and pure air ; for the apparatus 
might be in operation at all times, day and night, acting as a perpetual 
pump in drawing off the miasmata. The only attention required would 
be, to secure the blowing tube in its proper position with regard to the 
wind during storms. In ordinary weather its movements might be regu- 
lated by a vane, as in the figure, when it would require no attention what- 
ever. The upper side of the blowing part of the tube should be cut partly 
away at the end, so as to facilitate the entrance of descending currents of 
wind. See the above figure. 



ChaD. 3.] Vacuum by Currents of Steam. 489 



CHAP TER III 



Vacuum by currents of steam— Various modes of applying them in blowing tubes — Experiments — 
Effects of conical ajutages — Results of slight changes in the position of vacuum tubes within blowing 
ones — Double blowing tube — Experiments with it — Raising water by currents of steam — Ventilation of 
mines — Experimental apparatus for concentrating sirups in vacuo — Drawing air through liquids to pro 
mote their evaporation — Remarks on tbe origin of obtaining a vacuum by currents of steam. 

As the utmost rarefaction which can be produced with blowing tubes 
by the lungs is exceedingly limited, we next endeavored to ascertain how 
far it could be carried with currents of steam. This fluid presents several 
advantages. By it a uniform blast can be obtained and kept up, and its 
intensity can be increased or diminished at pleasure : hence experiments 
with it can be continued, repeated or varied, till the results can be relied 
on. As it is inconvenient to measure high degrees of rarefaction by col- 
umns of water, mercury was employed for that purpose ; and as the 
blowing tubes &c. if made of lead or block tin would have become soft 
and bent by the heat, they were all made of copper, while the additional 
or conical tubes (generally) were of cast brass, and smoothly bored. A 
detail of all or even half the experiments made would possess no interest 
to general readers, and would be out of place here ; we therefore merely 
notice such as gave the best results. The force of the highest steam used 
was equal to a pressure of 90 pounds on the inch. It was measured by 
the hydrostatic safety-valve described in the Journal of the Franklin Insti- 
tute, vol. x 2d series, page 2. 

While engaged in the prosecution of this subject, we supposed that cur- 
rents of steam had never been employed to produce a vacuum ; but it will 
be seen towards the close of the chapter, that we were anticipated by a 
French gentleman, though to what extent we are yet uninformed. We 
were not aware of the fact until all the following experiments had been 
matured, and most of them repeatedly performed. The circumstance af- 
fords another example of those coincidences of mental and mechanical 
effort and resource with which the history of the arts is and always will 
be crowded. The shoemakers' awl was formerly straight, but is now bent : 
the author of the improvement was supposed to have lived in comparatively 
modern times; but recent researches among the monuments of Egypt 
have proved, that the artists who made shoes and wrought in leather under 
the Pharaohs used awls identical in shape with the modern ones. 

The expenditure of high steam through open blowing tubes like those 
figured in Nos. 203 and 204 would obviously be enormous, since there is 
nothing in them to prevent its passing freely through. They are not there- 
fore so well calculated for practical operations as those in which the end 
of the exhausting pipe projects into the blowing one and contracts the 
passage for the vapor, as in Nos. 205 — 210. These are also better on 
another account — they produce a better vacuum. Economy in the em- 
ployment of steam is of the first importance ; hence it was desirable to 
determine if possible that particular construction of the apparatus by which 
the highest degree of rarefaction may be obtained with the least expendi- 
ture of vapor. Fortunately for the solution of this problem, there is one 
form of the apparatus in which both are eminently combined ; for while 

62 



490 



Apparatus for employing Currents of Steam. 



[Book V. 



an increase of the steam's elasticity increased the vacuum, an increased 
discharge of the vapor was often found to diminish it. This was frequently 
the case when high steam was employed : for example, if the cock through 
which steam passed into the blowing tube marked C in No. 217 was wide 
open, the mercury would sometimes fall two or three inches, but when 
partially closed, would instantly rise ; thus indicating that it is the velocity 
and not the volume of vapor passing over the orifice of the exhausting 
pipe, upon which the vacuum depends. 




No. 216. No. 217. 



No. 218. 



No 219. 



We first passed steam through tubes connected like No. 213, both with 
and without the conical ajutages C D in Nos. 211 and 212. Various pro- 
portions of the steam passage over the orifices of the vacuum or exhausting 
pipes were also employed, as at A, B, C, D, E, No. 216, which repre- 
sent horizontal sections of the vacuum pipe and steam passage over its 
orifice. The dark parts show the passage for the steam, and the inner 
circle the mouth of the vacuum tube. In A the steam channel did not 
extend over one-fourth of the circumference of the orifice ; in B it reached 
nearly half way round ; in C three-fourths ; while in D and E it extended 
entirely round. Upon trial, the vacuum produced by B was greater than 
that by A ; C surpassed B, and D uniformly exceeded them all. We 
therefore finally arranged the apparatus as shown at No. 217, in which A 
is a brass tube composed of two conical frustums united at their lesser 
ends. The longer part, A, was smoothly bored and polished in the direc- 
tion of its length, to remove any minute ridges left by the borer. The 
interior diameter of the large end was an inch and an eighth, and of the 
smallest part nineteen-fortieths, (rather less than half an inch.) The ex- 
ternal diameter of the vacuum pipe B was seventeen-fortieths, so that the 
annular space left round it for the steam was only one-fortieth of an inch 
in width, being about as small a space as could well be formed without 
the pipe B touching A. The length of A from the contracted part was 
5% inches. A glass tube three feet long, whose lower end was placed in 



Chap. 3.] Effect of Conical Ajutages. 491 

a vessel of quicksilver, was attached to B, and a scale to measure the 
ascent of the mercurial column. 

When the pressure of the steam in the boiler was equal to 30 pounds 
on the inch exclusive of atmospheric pressure, and the steam cock C 
opened, (the hole in its plug was five-sixteenths of an inch in diameter) 
the mercury rose 9 inches in the vacuum tube B. When the steam was 
at 40 pounds, the mercury rose 15J inches. At 50 pounds it reached over 
18 inches, at 60 pounds over 19 inches, and at 70 pounds 21 inches. At 
SO pounds it was only 21 inches, but on partially closing the cock it sprung 
up to 22 inches. When the steam was at 90 pounds on the inch, the mer- 
cury fell to 20 inches, but on turning the plug of C it rose to 22 inches. 
These experiments were repeated several times and on different occasions 
without materially altering the results. 

The effect of additional tubes inserted into the open end of A was next 
observed. Ten or twelve of these were made of tin plate, and of different 
lengths and taper. The small ends of all were half an inch in diameter, 
and made very thin, so as to slide into A nearly up to the contracted part, 
and at the same time to present the least projection possible to the issuing 
current. The effect of three of these tubes, two of which gave the best 
results, are stated in the following table. The tube No. 1 was 14 inches 
long, and its wide end 1^ inches across. No. 2 was 27 inches long, and If 
in diameter at its mouth. No. 3 was five feet long, and its mouth or wide 
end 2J inches in diameter. 

Pressure of steam in pounds Vacuum in inches of mercury 
on each square inch. with apparatus No. 217. 

30 - - - 9 

40 - 15.5 - 

50 - 18.1 - - 

60 - 19.6 - 

70 - - - 21 

80 - - - 21 

" - - - 22 

90 - - - 20 

- 22 

In adjusting an additional tube it was moved till its axis coincided with 
that of A. This was ascertained by the mercury, which oscillated with 
every movement of the tube, but always rose when it was in the position 
indicated. On one occasion, when the mercury stood at 15 inches, the 
additional tube No. 1 was slipped into A and the mercury fell to 12 inches; 
but this was caused by pushing the tube in too far, i. e. till it touched the 
vacuum pipe — for on withdrawing it and swelling out the end a little, the 
mercury rose to 17 inches on the tube being reinserted. A small addition 
was made to the wide end of No. 1, so that it flared out like a trumpet : 
on trying it, the mercury stood two inches lower than before. 

The fall of the mercury when the steam was raised to 90 pounds, was 
quite unexpected. It was at first supposed to have been caused by a 
wrong position of the additional tube, and then to some small object lodged 
by the steam between the vacuum and the blowing pipes; but on exami- 
nation nothing of the kind was found. As the mercury still refused to rise, 
we tried another apparatus similar in all respects to No. 217, except being 
of rather larger dimensions ; but the same thing occurred. When the 
steam was at 30 pounds the mercury stood at 7f inches — at 50 pounds 17 
inches — at 60 pounds 20 inches — at 70 pounds 22 inches — at 80 pounds 
23J inches — and at 90 pounds 20 inches ! Several experiments seemed 



fACCUM WITH ADDITIONAL TUBES. 


No.l. 


No. 2. 


No. 3. 


- 10 


11 





- 17 


18 


10.5 


- 20 


20.5 


— 


- 20.5 


22 


— 


- 21.5 


22.8 


16.5 


- 22 


23.5 


— 


- 22 


23.5 


— 


- 20 


21 


— 


- 22 


— 


— 



492 Position of Vacuum Tubes within blowing ones. [Book V. 

to indicate that the length and taper of the additional tubes should vary 
with the force of the steam, and that the annular passage for the vapor 
should be contracted as the elastic force of the steam was increased. 

Cylindrical pipes applied to the mouth of A, or to those of the addi- 
tional tubes, caused the mercury to fall ; but any plane object held against 
the current issuing from A, did not affect the vacuum. A piece of board 
was gradually brought to within one-fourth of an inch of the end of A, and 
of course deflected the steam at right angles ; yet the vacuum was not in 
the least diminished until the board was pushed still nearer. By applying 
the large ends of the additional tubes to A the vacuum was diminished. 

The noise made by the steam issuing from A is indicative of the state 
of the vacuum. If it be loud and sonorous, the vacuum is not near so high 
as when the sound is less and hissing. In the former case there is generally 
too much steam escaping — the cock should be partially closed. 

No. 218 is a vertical and a horizontal section of the device by means of 
which the vacuum tube was retained in a position either eccentric or con- 
centric with the blowing one, and by which it could be drawn to one side 
so as to touch the narrowest part of the latter. Three fine screws with 
blunt ends were tapped at equal distances from each other into solid pro- 
jections cast on A, 1% inches below the contracted part. By these, the 
exact position of the vacuum tube which gave the best result was accu- 
rately ascertained ; and it was remarkable how small a change in its posi- 
tion affected the mercurial column. A few examples are annexed : — 1. 
The steam in the boiler being low, and the mercury standing at 3J inches 
only, the vacuum tube was drawn by the screws so as barely to touch A, 
and instantly the mercury fell to 2 inches. 2. When the pipes were clear 
of each, and the mercury 19J inches high, as soon as they touched it fell 
to 16 inches. Similar results took place whatever might be the force of 
the steam. 3. The mercury fell also when the axis of both tubes did not 
quite coincide, although a clear passage still remained for the steam, as 
shown at E, No. 216. In this case, as in the others, the greater flow of 
vapor on one side probably created cross currents in A, after passing the 
contracted part. On one occasion, the mercury suddenly fell several inches 
while the pipes were concentric with each other. Upon examination this 
was found to be owing to a minute piece of grit, or a film of lead, blown 
by the steam between the two pipes, where it was wedged in. It did not 
exceed one-sixteenth of an inch in any direction. It produced the same 
effect as when the pipes touched. Upon removing it, the steam rose as 
before. 

Another point necessary to be attended to is the position of the orifice 
of the vacuum pipe with respect to the narrowest part of the blowing one; 
i. e. whether in a line with it, or in advance, or behind it, as figured at A 
B C No. 219. To test the effect of these various positions, the vacuum 
pipe was so arranged by a screw cut on it, as to be pushed in or drawn 
back at pleasure. In one experiment, the mercury stood at 21- inches 
when they were on a line, as at A. The vacuum tube was pushed for- 
ward three-sixteenths of an inch without any change in the vacuum; but 
when the pipe protruded three-eighths, as at B, the mercury fell to 18 
inches. It was then drawn behind the contracted part of A, and the mer- 
cury instantly began to fall. When the orifice was one-fourth of an inch 
behind, the mercury fell from 21 inches to 4 ; and when drawn back one- 
eighth of an inch more, as at C, the steam descended the vacuum tube and 
blew the mercury out of the vessel that contained it. In another experi- 
ment, the vacuum tube was one-fourth of an inch in advance of the con- 
tracted part, and the mercury 20 inches high : when the tube was drawn 




Chap. 3.] Double Blowing Tube. 493 

back so that its end was in a line with the contracted part, the mercury 
rose half an inch. When drawn back one-eighth of an inch, it fell to 
17J inches. 

That part of the vacuum tube within the steam chamber, or back end 
of A, should be straight, and its axis should coincide as nearly as possible 
with that of A, else the vapor in passing over the orifice will be more or 
less deflected to one side, and thus diminish the vacuum. 

Although the blowing tube figured at No. 217 has its mouth opening 
upwards, in practice we used it in a horizontal position, as at No. 219, or 
rather inclined downwards, as at No. 221, that the condensed vapor might 
not fall back and enter the vacuum tube. 

No. 220 represents another modification of this mode of removing at- 
mospheric pressure, by which the vacuum may be carried to 
a greater extent than with No. 217. It consists of two blow- 
ing tubes attached to one vacuum pipe. The lower blowing 
tube in its narrowest part was seven-twentieths of an inch in 
diameter, and the annular passage for the steam between it 
and the vacuum pipe was only one-fiftieth of an inch in width. 
The bore of the steam cock and pipe C was three-tenths of an 
inch. The upper end of the lower blowing tube was half an 
inch in diameter, and terminated at the contracted part of a 
larger one, D, where a space of one-thirtieth of an inch was 
left for the steam between them. D was six inches long, and 
its upper end an inch in diameter. It was also furnished with 
steam by the pipe and cock E. (Both blowing tubes in 
the accompanying illustration are figured too large for the 
exhausting one.) 

When this device was tried, the safety-valve of the boiler 

indicated a pressure of 40 pounds on the inch. The cock E 

was first opened, and as the steam rushed from D the mercury 

rose 8 inches. E was then closed and C opened, upon which 

the mercury rose 8.8 inches. Both cocks were then opened, 

and the mercury rose 16.6 inches. 

When the steam was at 60 pounds and E opened, the mercurial column 

was 9 inches. With E closed and C opened it rose 15 inches. Both 

cocks were next opened, and the height was increased to 20 inches. 

Steam at 80 pounds and E open, the mercury stood at 17.5 inches. C 
open and E shut, it rose to 21 inches ; and when both were opened, it 
reached to 24J inches. The addition of another blowing tube over D 
would most likely have carried it to the full height of the barometer. If 
D were inserted in a chimney in the direction of the flue, it would not 
only increase the draft, but the draft would increase the vacuum. 

The steam pipe that supplied D was then unscrewed from the cock E, 
which was left open. The cock C was again opened, and the mercury 
rose as before to 21 inches, the air rushing through E producing no effect 
on the column except rendering its surface slightly concave. By often 
closing and opening the orifice of E with the finger, no sensible change in 
the vacuum could be perceived. 

After removing the vessel of mercury from the bottom of the vacuum 
pipe, a piece of twine several yards in length which happened to be laying 
on the ground near by, was drawn into the tube and discharged through 
D. This was repeated several times. By presenting one end near the 
end of the glass tube, the whole was almost instantaneously drawn up and 
thrown out by the steam, although the vacuum tube was continued in a 
horizontal position nearly two feet before it was connected to the glass 



494 Raising Water by Currents of Steam. [Book V. 

one. On applying a vessel of sand, and another of water, to the end of 
the tube, the contents of both were raised and discharged in the same way. 

The vacuum tube of No. 220 was connected to a soda fountain, and an 
opening one-sixteenth of an inch diameter made in the latter to admit air. 
The mercury previous to making this opening stood at 16 inches, and it 
still remained at that height. The opening was next widened to one- 
eighth of an inch, when the mercury fell to 12 inches. The opening was 
then made as large as the bore of the vacuum tube, (about five-sixteenths) 
upon which the mercury fell to six inches. 

It is obvious that by connecting one of these blowing instruments to an 
air-tight vessel, water may be raised into the latter by the atmosphere, and 
to an elevation corresponding with the vacuum. In one of our earliest 
experiments, we attached a blowing tube to a soda fountain placed 22 feet 
above the surface of the water in a well, into which a pipe descended from 
the upper part of the fountain. But by arranging a series of close vessels 
at certain distances above each other, (according to the extent of the vacu- 
um obtained by the apparatus) water may be raised in this manner to any 
elevation — the pressure of the atmosphere transferring it from one vessel 
to another till it arrive at the place of discharge, as in Papin's plan, de- 
scribed at page 447-8. An English patent was granted in 1839 for a very 
elaborate French machine of this kind. See Civil Engineer and Architect's 
Journal, vol. iii, page 51. In December 1840, an American patent was 
obtained for the same thing by a French merchant of this city. This gen- 
tleman has had one constructed from drawings sent from Paris. The re- 
ceiving vessels were 12 feet apart. The mode of applying the steam is 
to discharge it at the orifice of the vacuum pipe, over a small part of the 
periphery, as at A No. 216. The steam however does not come in contact 
with the sides of the vacuum tube, as in the preceding figures No. 217 to 
220, for this tube does not form one of the walls of the small steam cham- 
ber behind its orifice — the chamber being a separate part complete in itself, 
and having a semicircular recess formed at one side, into which the va- 
cuum pipe is received. There is therefore, between the interior of the 
vacuum tube and the steam without, not only the thickness of the metal of 
which that tube is fabricated, but also the thickness of the plate of which 
the steam chamber is made. Floats are arranged in the interior of the 
receiving vessels, so that when one of the latter is filled with water from 
the one below, the float opens a valve to admit the atmosphere to press 
the contents into the vessel next above it. 

There is another mode of raising water to considerable elevations by an 
apparatus like Nos. 217 and 220, and for which they seem much better 
adapted than any other, viz. by admitting portions of air to mix with the 
ascending liquid, as in the examples given at pp. 224, 225. No air-tight 
receiver would then be required, as both the air and water would be dis- 
charged with the steam at the open end of the blowing tube, which, for 
the reason already stated, should be inclined downwards. 

Wherever large volumes of air are required to be withdrawn, as in the 
ventilation of mines, these instruments we believe would be found as effi- 
cient and economical as any device yet tried. A number of vacuum tubes, 
whose lower ends were made to terminate in different parts of a mine — 
(they might be of leather or other flexible materials, so as readily to be 
moved wherever required) — and whose upper ones were connected to 
one or more blowing tubes through which currents of steam were con- 
stantly passing, would effectually withdraw the noxious vapors from below, 
and induce a more copious supply of fresh air than any forcing apparatus 
could ever furnish. The waste steam of engines at coal or other mines 



Chap. 3.] Apparatus for evaporating liquids in vacuo. 495 

might be beneficially applied to large blowing tubes, and thus contribute 
to the same result. 

There are other useful applications of these blowing instruments. One 
of our first attempts was to employ them as substitutes for the expensive 
air-pumps worked by steam-engines, employed in evaporating sirups and 
refining sugar by Howard's vacuum plan. 




No. 221. Apparatus for evaporating liquids in vacuo. 

We fitted up a very strong old still, (No. 221) three feet in diameter and 
about the same in depth. A jacket of copper was fitted to its lower part 
so as to form a double bottom. The discharging pipe passed through the 
jacket, and was closed by a valve V. Steam being conveyed into the 
jacket heated the liquid within the still, but instead of taking steam from 
the boiler expressly for this purpose, we made use of that by which the 
vacuum was produced. The open end of a blowing tube was inserted 
into the jacket as represented in the cut, and the vacuum tube B connected 
by a cock to the neck of the still. C the steam cock and pipe leading to 
the boiler. D a pipe that conveyed the surplus steam from the jacket 
into the chimney. The orifice of the vacuum pipe within the blowing one 
was three-eighths of an inch diameter, and the annular space around it for 
the passage of the steam was the same as in No. 217. At the first trial 
with this apparatus, 25 gallons of sirup were put into the still through the 
funnel, and the cock shut. The steam cock C was then opened, and in a 
few moments the mercury in the gauge rose 15 inches, but in eight minutes 
fell to 10 inches, the fall being occasioned by the evolution of vapor in the 
still. The steam in the boiler was raised higher, until the mercury rose 
to 16 inches ; but after the operation had been continued about half an 
hour it commenced rising, and was at 18 inches when the experiment was 
closed. On another trial 32 gallons of sirup were poured in, and when 
C was opened the mercury rose to 22 inches, but in ten minutes fell to 17. 
In half an hour it began slowly to rise, and in fifteen minutes reached to 
20 inches, at which height it remained when the concentrated sirup was 
withdrawn. 

Had a double tube like No. 220 been used, the vacuum might probably 
have been carried to 28 or 29 inches, and the operation performed in much 
less time. The experiment however shows how small a tube can with- 



496 Origin of obtaining a Vacuum by Currents of Steam. [Book V 

draw the vapor arising from a surface of seven square feet. It would be 
an advantage to apply two or perhaps three separate blowing tubes, of 
different sizes, to each sugar pan — using the largest first, to draw off the 
the bulk of the vapor, and finishing with the smaller ones. There would 
be a saving of steam, and the vacuum might be carried higher towards 
the close of an operation with a very small tube and current. 

Another mode of using these tubes to promote evaporation, is to draw 
air through liquids instead of forcing it through them with pumps, as in 
the pneumatic processes of concentrating sirups. An open boiler, four feet 
in diameter, was inverted and placed in another over a fire and containing 
sirup : a blowing tube, the orifice of whose vacuum pipe was three-fourths 
of an inch diameter, was connected to the inverted vessel, and it drew so 
much air under the edges as to cool the liquid to such a degree that the 
operation of concentration was prolonged to twice the ordinary time. 

While engaged in making the experiments described in this chapter, (in 
i835) and stimulated by the conviction that we were the first thus to apply 
currents of steam for the purposes of raising water and promoting the 
evaporation of liquids at low temperatures, &c. we were exceedingly sur- 
prised to learn that something of the kind had been previously done, or 
proposed to be done, in France. As we had made preparations to secure 
the invention by a patent here, and by others in Europe, our experiments 
were discontinued with a view to ascertain the particulars of the French 
plan, that it might be known whether we were traveling on beaten ground 
or not ; but to the present time we have not obtained any specific descrip- 
tion of it, nor do we know whether it consisted of a jet of steam discharged 
through the centre of a tube, as in Nos. 208, 210, and as applied to in- 
crease the draft of chimneys in locomotive carriages, or whether the jet 
was directed over the outside of a part or the whole of the end of the 
vacuum tube — nor have we learnt what degree of rarefaction was obtained. 
We have therefore concluded to insert the preceding notice of our labors, 
that since we cannot claim priority in the research, we may be allowed 
the credit, if any be due, for our modes of application, and the extent to 
which they carried the vacuum and are obviously capable of carrying it, 
especially by such devices as No. 220. 

The whole of the devices, from the blowing tubes described in the last 
chapter to the apparatus for boiling sugar in vacuo described in this, with 
the exception of the patented plan of raising water by a series of vessels 
on different levels, originated entirely with ourselves, nor were we in- 
debted either directly or remotely for so much as a hint in maturing them 
to any persons or writings whatever ; and upon them we have also spent 
no inconsiderable amount both of time and money. But as we have on 
several occasions shown that new devices, so called, are often old ones, it 
is but just that we should mete to ourselves the same measure which we 
have given to others. We therefore with pleasure record the fact, that at 
a meeting of the Paris Academy of Arts and Sciences, held in January, 
1833, M. Pellatans read a paper on the dynamic effects of a jet of steam, 
of which a notice (not a description of the plan) was published in an Eng- 
lish journal, and copied into the Journal of the Franklin Institute for March 
of the same year — vol. x, 2d series, p. 195. 

There is also described in the London Mechanics' Magazine, vol. iii, p. 
275, an experiment of a current of air from a bellows directed over the 
orifice of an inverted glass funnel, which was placed in a saucer filled with 
water. From this (which we did not see till recently) the blowing tubes 
described in the last chapter might, with a little ingenuity, have been 
deduced. 



Chap. 4.] Spouting Tubes, 497 



CHAP TE R IV 



Spouting tubes — Water easily disturbed — Force economically transmitted by the oscillation of liquids 
— Experiments on the ascent of water in differently shaped tubes — Application of one form to siphons- 
Movement given to spouting tubes — These produce a jet both by their ascent and descent — Experiments 
with plain conical tubes — Spouting tubes with air pipes attached — Experiments with various sized tubes 
— Observations respecting their movements — Advantages arising from inertia — Modes of communicating 
motion to spouting tubes — Purposes for which they are applicable — The Souffleur. 

There is a simple mode of raising water which to our knowledge has 
never been adopted, nor yet suggested — viz. by straight and open pipes, or, 
as they might be named, spouting tubes. 

Water is raised in the ram (No. 168) by the force which the liquid ac- 
quires in flowing through descending channels, but in the instruments to 
which we now refer, the same effect is produced by its momentum in 
passing up vertical ones. So far as respects the force of a liquid in mo- 
tion, it makes little difference in what direction it moves — whether the 
liquid rise perpendicularly, or having first descended at one angle it ascend 
at another. A jet d'eau, deducting all resistances, rises with the velocity 
with which it would fall through the same space ;'but in practice, the ve- 
locity is diminished by the length, figure and dimensions of the channel 
through which the liquid flows, and of the ajutage from which it escapes. 

Every person's experience teaches him, that a very small force is suffi- 
cient to disturb a large body of water, and that the consequent movement 
of the liquid is long continued after the force is withdrawn. A stone dropt 
into a tank, or thrown into a pond, causes waves to rise and roll to and 
fro over their whole surfaces, and some time elapses ere the movements 
cease. Days and even weeks elapse after a storm is over before the ocean 
recovers its previous repose. This effect is the result of the great mobility 
of water ; its particles move with such extreme facility among themselves, 
and so actively impart their motion to each other, that a force once com- 
municated to them is long ere it becomes exhausted. It is the same to a 
certain extent when waves rise and fall within tubes ; for although the 
friction of liquids against the sides of these channels is considerable, espe- 
cially in small ones, still the force in the central parts is but slowly con- 
sumed. A device therefore by which the oscillation of liquids is employed 
in transmitting forces, will probably consume as little in the transit as any 
mechanical device known. 

It has already been remarked, that the momentum of a flowing liquid 
suffers less in passing through a short than through a long tube — through 
a straight than a crooked one ; and we may add that this is more especially 
true when the figure of the tube is expressly designed to facilitate the 
passage of the moving liquid, instead of being uniform in its bore through- 
out. Now in these particulars spouting tubes are eminently superior to 
others, or they may be made so. They are short, straight, and of a form 
adapted to the rising wave within them. 

Motion is imparted to water in a spouting tube either by depressing the 
liquid below the orifice and then admitting it to enter, or by excluding it 
from the tube till the lower orifice of the latter be sufficiently immersed. 
If a pipe whose lower end is closed be plunged perpendicularly in water, 

63 



493 



Experiments with Spouting or Open Tubes. [Book V. 



the liquid will rise within it the moment its end is opened ; but it will 
depend upon the length and figure of the tube, and the relative proportion 
of its two orifices, whether the liquid rush up above the surface without, 
or slowly reach it and there remain. 

The following are selected from a number of experiments made several 
years ago. Instead of closing the lower orifice, the upper one was closed 
with the fore finger, the confined air acting the part of a cork, and pre- 
venting the liquid from entering until the finger was removed. 




Nos. 222. 223. 224. 225. 



227. 



228. 



Exper. I. — No. 222, a cylindrical glass tube, 18 inches long and half-inch 
bore. Its upper orifice was closed air-tight by the finger, and the lower 
one then held four inches under the surface of the water in the vessel. 
Upon raising the finger, the liquid rose in the tube six inches ; i. e. its 
momentum carried it two inches higher than the surface in the cistern, 
and after a few oscillations it settled at the same level. Cylindrical 
tubes of various sizes were tried at different depths, and the average ex- 
tent of the rise (above the surface) was equal to half the length of the part 
of the tube immersed below the surface. If No. 222 dipped four inches, 
the rise was two — if eight inches, it was four — and if twelve, it was six. 
By contracting either orifice the effect was diminished. 

Exper. II. — No. 223, a tube slightly conical, 16 inches long, the dia- 
meter or bore of the large end half an inch, and that of the small end one- 
third of an inch. The rise of the liquid in this exceeded that in No. 222. 
When tried with the large end up, little or no rise took place. 

Exper. III. — No. 224, another tube, 18 inches in length, the diameter 
of whose upper orifice was three-sixteenths and of the lower seven-eighths 
of an inch. Four and a half inches of the lower part was cylindrical. 
When dipped four inches in water and the finger removed, the liquid rose 
but two inches above the surface. This was owing to the cylindrical form 
of the lower part of the tube, all the water that entered being required to 
fill the lower part. When the dip was six inches, the rise was five ; when 
eight, the jet passed out of the tube and ascended sixteen inches. When 
the tube was lowered to ten inches below the surface, the jet rose thirty 
inches; and when the end of the tube was twelve inches under the surface, 
the jet ascended four feet and a half. Fourteen inches dip threw it six 



Chap. 4.] Experiments with Spouting or Open Tubes. 499 

feet, and sixteen inches dip caused it to ascend over seven feet. The rise 
in cylindrical tubes, we have seen, bore the same relation to the dip at 
various depths ; but this experiment shows that the elevation of the jet in 
conical tubes increases in a much greater ratio. 

Exper. IV. — To include the extreme proportions between the two ori- 
fices, we next took a matrass or bolt head (No. 225) and cut a portion 
from the globe opposite the junction of the neck or pipe. The opening 
thus made was 3J inches, and the orifice of the tube three-tenths. When 
the lower end was thrust two inches below the surface, scarcely any rise 
took place upon removing the finger ; and when half the length of the 
whole was immersed, say ten inches, the rise did not exceed six or seven. 
The reason was plain : the large volume of air contained in the lower part 
could not be expelled instantaneously by the pressure of the liquid column 
through the small orifice above, but the force of the ascending liquid was 
consumed in doing this. Various portions were now cut from the lower 
part, with a view to ascertain the greatest rise that could be obtained with 
a dip of four inches. This occurred when the diameter of the lower end 
was reduced to 1^ inches : the liquid then rose between nine and ten 
inches above the surface. The upper end was now heated in the flame 
of a lamp, and the bore enlarged by pressing into it a tapered piece of 
wood, till the end resembled the conical ajutage C D in No. 201. This 
caused the liquid to rise an inch higher. 

Exper. V. — A number of conical tubes of the same length, (21 inches) 
whose wide ends diverged or flared differently, were next procured, with 
the view of selecting those through which the jet rose the highest, as 
affording an approximation to the best form. The one represented at No. 
226 gave a better result than any other. With a dip of four inches the 
jet rose thirteen. The diameter of its lower orifice was 1.6 inches, and 
that of the upper one .4 : three inches below the latter, the bore was .2. 
At seven inches from the small end, the bore was .3 — at fourteen inches, 
.4 — and at seventeen inches, .5. The curve given to the flaring part of 
the lower end should be that which the fluid itself assumes in entering ; 
but that given in the figure is sufficient for all practical purposes to which 
small instruments of this kind are applicable. 

Before proceeding we may observe, that these instruments, simple as 
they are, and even when charged in the manner indicated above, are sus- 
ceptible of some useful applications ; among which maybe named siphons. 
If the tube No. 226 were bent in the form of one, it might be applied in 
numerous cases to transfer acids or other liquids ; and as it would be 
charged by the mere act of inserting its short leg into the liquid to be 
withdrawn, there could be no danger from sucking, &c. as in using the 
ordinary instrument. It will moreover be perceived from the third expe- 
riment, that the extent to which these siphons are applicable increases 
with the depth to which the short leg can be immersed : but as this chapter 
is appropriated to the application of spouting tubes to raise water from 
one level and discharge it at a higher one, their employment as siphons 
will be illustrated in a subsequent part of this volume. 

It will at once occur to every machinist, that to render these tubes of 
any practical value for raising water, some mode of working them very 
different from that of alternately opening and closing the upper orifice with 
the finger, and raising them wholly out of and then plunging them into the 
liquid, would be required : a mode of regularly and rapidly depressing 
the liquid within them, that the wave formed by its ascent might rise and 
fall uniformly. 

There is a simple way of doing this : — If the whole of the tube No. 227 



500 Raising Water with Open Tubes. [Book V. 

be sunk perpendicularly in water, except one or two inches by which it is 
held, and then raised eight or ten inches, air will enter the small orifice 
and fill the part previously occupied by the liquid : if the upward move- 
ment be very slow, the air will gradually fill the interior without disturbing 
the surface of the liquid; but if the tube be raised by a rapid movement 
or slight jerk, the air will then rush into the void with a force that will 
push down the liquid before it to a considerable depth, so that on the re- 
ascent of the liquid its momentum will project a portion in the form of a 
jet, precisely like Nos. 224, 225 and 226. It is surprising how elevated 
a wave is generated in the tube by the slightest ascent of the latter, pro- 
vided its movement be made sufficiently quick. The rise of the water, 
too, follows that of the tube so rapidly that most observers at first suppose 
them to rise simultaneously. The fact is, the liquid when depressed re- 
turns with such velocity as to escape from the tube the instant the stroke 
is finished, and even before its motion be slackened. 

Exper. VI. A jet may be produced by the descent of the tube as well as 
by its ascent. Let No. 22S be so held that its lower end dip not more than 
an inch or an inch and a half in the water, and then be pushed quickly 
down eight or ten inches — a stream will be projected from its upper ori- 
fice to an elevation of six or seven feet, and will be instantly followed by 
another that will reach nearly as high. The same cause operates here as 
in the upward movement, but it is differently excited. A small part only 
of the air within is expelled at the end of the stroke, on account of the 
tube's rapid descent, and consequently the water is prevented from enter- 
ing ; but as soon as this movement of the tube ceases, the liquid rushes in 
and a portion ascends in the form of a jet. On the subsequent ebb of the 
wave within, another one rises nearly equal to the first, and causes the 
second jet. The following experiment will illustrate both movements : — 
A small glass tube eight inches long, its wide end an inch and five-eighths 
diameter and its small end one-eighth, was employed. By its upward 
movement or stroke the extremity of the jet reached to an elevation of nine 
feet. By the downward stroke a jet rose six feet, which was succeeded 
by another that reached four feet and a half. Now if both movements 
are properly combined in a spouting tube of large dimensions, we believe 
the instrument may be made to raise as much water, in circumstances 
adapted to its employment, as any other hydro-pneumatic machine. 

If the figure given to No. 226 should be found better adapted than any 
other when the tube is used as a siphon, it does not therefore follow that 
the same form would be the most suitable to produce jets of water. In 
the former case the instrument acts while at rest, but in the latter a con- 
stant and rapid movement is required : hence, to prevent an unnecessary 
expenditure of the power employed, it should be so formed as to present 
as little opposing surface to the resistance of the dense fluid in which it 
works as is consistent with the elevation, or quantity of water to be raised 
by it. This remark applies particularly to the lower or wide end, for if 
that part be suddenly expanded or flared like a trumpet, a volume of water 
of equal diameter has to be displaced in the reservoir every time the tube 
is pushed down, and also a ring of water whose external diameter is the 
same (the internal one being bounded by the tube) every time the latter 
is lifted up. When used as spouting tubes the lower end should there- 
fore flare very little, if any, unless in cases where the outlay of power to 
work them is of little consequence or of secondary importance. The 
upper end of a spouting tube, when intended to throw jets from its orifice, 
should not diverge like that of No. 226, since the elevation of the stream 
would be thereby diminished : instead of rising in a compact jet, it would 



Chap. 4.] 



Raising Water with Open Tubes. 



501 



sooner become expanded and broken. When, however, one of these 
instruments is intended to deliver water at a level with its upper orifice 
only, then the discharging orifice should resemble that of No. 226, or C D 
in No. 201, as an increased discharge of the liquid would in that case take 
place : a greater flow of air would enter on the ascent of the tube, and a 
larger volume of water flow out on its return. 

Exper. VII. — A number of conical tubes, ten inches long, were 
prepared. The diameter of the small ends of all was \ inch, while the 
large ends were respectively 4 inches, 3J, 3, 2f , 2 J, 2J, 2, If, lj, lj and 
1 ; and besides these, two cylindrical ones of \ inch and \ inch bore. 
With the cylindrical tubes no jet could be produced by any movement 
given to them, either quick or slow, however deep they were immersed ; 
nor yet when they were inclined. When the conical ones were immersed 
half their length, and worked without plunging them deeper, no water 
could be ejected : the cause of this however was not the same in all. In 
six or seven of the largest, the parts below the surface were too capacious 
to be filled instantaneously with air through the small orifice above as they 
were raised. The sound made by the entering fluid (like a person gasping 
for breath) showed this, especially in the largest. But in the smaller sizes, 
the air entered as fast as they were raised, and consequently disturbed but 
slightly the surface of the liquid within. 

When any one of them was immersed within an inch of the small end 
and then moved two or three inches up and down, a jet was thrown out, 
and from the large ones with considerable force, on account of the greater 
mass of the liquid put in motion in their lower part. Still, however, the 
jet did not rise so high from the large as from some of the smaller tubes, 
because the sides of the former converged so rapidly to the discharging 
orifice that the liquid particles crossed and counteracted each other as they 
issued. Short cylindrical ajutages soldered on two of the largest made 
no sensible improvement. The disadvantages of making the lower parts 

too wide or spacious for the 
entering air fully to occupy, 
was also very apparent when 
the tubes were raised five or 
six inches in working them. 
The water within not being 
wholly displaced, it hung in 
them as in an inverted tum- 
bler or bucket, and conse- 
quently its weight was add- 
ed to that of the tube. This 
not only required an increase 
of force, but the intended 
effect was diminished and in 
a great measure destroyed. 
The same thing of course 
occurs if a smaller tube be 
used, with a large additional 
part to its lower extremity, 
as at No. 229. To obviate 
this by furnishing a larger 
supply than would enter the 
No, 229. No. 230. No. 231. No. 232. No. 233. smaller orifice, we adapted 

an air tube whose exterior 
end was covered by a valve opening upwards, as shown in the cut. The 




502 Raising Water with Open Tubes. [Book V. 

force required to work the larger tubes was very sensible, but with the 
smaller ones it was scarcely appreciable. Those whose larger ends were 
2 inches and If inches produced the highest jets, but they were obviously 
too much tapered for practical purposes, and even the sides of the smallest 
one named, formed too large an angle to be applied with advantage at 
great depths. 

The tube No. 230, two feet one inch in length, was made of tin plate. 
It consisted of a conical piece 22 inches long, lj inches wide at one end, 
and ^ inch at the other. To the wide end a flaring piece, 3 inches long 
and 4 diameter at the lower edge, was added. This piece was made of 
sheet lead for the convenience of forming it. When wholly immersed in 
water, except 2 or 3 inches by which it was held, this tube threw a jet 15 
feet high. By the upward stroke the jet rose 12 feet. When the diverg- 
ing ajutage A (whose contracted part was the same as the orifice of the 
tube) was slipped on the latter, the jet was dispersed before it rose 8 feet. 
An inch was cut off the lower end, leaving the diameter 3 inches, upon 
which the jet rose to about 14 feet. Another inch was then removed, 
when it rose still lower ; yet it might still, by a quick back stroke, be 
thrown nearly as high as at the first. It would therefore seem, that al- 
though a large flaring end requires more force to raise it than a small one, 
yet the increased velocity required to be given to the downward stroke, 
in order to raise the jet to an equal height, comes to much the same thing. 
There is a way however by which the resistance which a large flaring end 
meets with from the water may be avoided in the upioard stroke, viz. by 
enclosing the tube in an air-tight cylindrical one, of the diameter of the 
flaring end, as represented by the dotted lines in No. 230 : or the instru- 
ment might be inserted in a wooden tube, whose specific gravity was 
about the same or rather less than that of water. 

No. 231 was 3J feet long, formed of copper, and of a regular taper to 
within four inches of its lower end. Its diameter at the small end was 
half an inch, and at the lower end 3j inches, to which a piece flared out 
to six inches was added. By an upward stroke of 18 inches, the jet rose 
17 feet ; and by a downward stroke of one foot, it rose to the same height. 
(These measurements, and the others mentioned, relate to the extreme 
height to which a small part only of the liquid rose. The main body of 
the jet seldom reached over two-thirds of the distance.) When the up- 
ward stroke was continued 2£ feet, the rushing air pushed all the water 
out of the tube, and rose up on the outside. 

Exper. VIII. — We next prepared a larger tube, and arranged it so as 
to be worked in a light wooden frame, which was secured in a wine pipe 
filled with water. (See No. 233. The wine cask is omitted.) This in- 
strument was deemed equal to any that was tried — the quantity of water, 
and the elevation to which it was raised, being compared with the force 
employed. It should not, however, be considered as exhibiting anything 
like the maximum effect which spouting tubes are capable of producing, 
because the friction of the liquid in passing through so small an orifice as 
that of No. 233 was very considerable. The reader is therefore requested 
to bear in mind, that the larger the bore of these tubes, the more favorable 
would be the result ; and that, although jets of water may be thrown very 
high by them, yet they are better adapted to raise large volumes of water 
to small heights. 

The tube No. 233 was five feet long. It was composed of one piece 4 
feet 4 inches in length, .75 of an inch diameter at one end, and 2.9 inches 
at the other. To this end a piece 5 inches long was added, which made 
the diameter 5.5 inches ; and to this another piece 3 inches long, which 



Chap. 4.] Raising Water with Open Tubes. 503 

made the extreme end of the tube 7.5 inches diameter. The tube as thus 
formed was secured to a straight strip of wood of nearly the same length, 
by means of three copper straps, which were soldered to the tube and 
screwed to the wood. (See the figure.) About a foot from each end, and 
across the back of the strip, two pieces of wood, 3 inches long and lj 
wide, were secured. They projected half an inch over each side of the 
strip, and were beveled at the ends, so as to fit into and slide readily up 
and down in a dovetailed groove formed on the face of the post F F. 
This post was secured in an inclined position, as represented. When 
large tubes are used they should always be inclined, that the water once 
raised above the orifice may not fall into it again and run back. The 
surface of the water in the cask was 13 inches below the upper end of the 
tube, and upon working the latter the jet (f of an inch diameter) rose 22 
feet. A piece of pipe was next slipped on the end, which made the tube 
a foot longer, and reduced the orifice to half an inch, when the jet rose 
little if any higher than before. Another tapered piece of pipe was added 
to the last, making the orifice five-sixteenths of an inch, upon which the 
jet did not ascend over six or eight feet. An air-pipe, figured at No. 232, 
was now added, that the water might be fully depressed in the tube on its 
ascent, but the jet was so pinched at the orifice that no obvious change 
was perceived. 

The upward stroke ought to be so regulated, that the air in rushing 
down should push nearly all the water out of the tube, that the wave in 
rising may be urged up with the full pressure of that above it in the re- 
servoir : hence the elevation of the jet produced by the upward stroke of 
a spouting tube depends chiefly upon the depth of its immersion. But if 
the upward movement exclude nearly all the water, the downward one 
if made with due velocity prevents it, or much of it, from entering before 
the tube itself gets nearly to the end of its stroke, and consequently the 
effective height of the hydrostatic column is then increased to an extent, 
equal to the length of the stroke. On the other hand, if the upward 
movement be made so quick that the air has not time to fill the enlarged 
space below before the stroke is finished, then little or no rise will take 
place. The operation in this case is the converse of the experiment with 
the matrass, No. 225. 

When the movements of one of these instruments are properly timed, 
the inertia of the descending air and ascending liquid is peculiarly bene 
ficial. In ordinary machines, where the direction of moving masses is 
reversed, or when they are alternately brought into a state of rest and 
motion, the inertia is overcome by an outlay of the force employed ; but 
this is not the case with spouting tubes. Thus when a tube is raised, the 
air descends into the vacuity left by the retiring liquid, and when its mo- 
mentum is expended, its motion is continued by inertia alone, and conse- 
quently the water is pushed down still further. Then again, on the ascent 
of the liquid the elevation of the jet, or the volume discharged, will be 
increased if the inertia of the rising wave be suffered to expend itself 
without interference by an untimely movement of the instrument. 

A reciprocating rectilinear movement might be given to spouting tubes 
by a spring-pole, as in the canne hydraulique. The movement, however, 
should be regulated by that of the wave. This might be accomplished in 
large tubes by connecting to the moving apparatus a heavy pendulum, 
whose length could be increased or diminished according to that of the 
stroke. 

If a tank or reservoir be not sufficiently deep for the employment of 
these tubes, an opening of the proper size and depth might be made at 



504 The Souffleur. [Book V 

the corner or side in which to work them. When water is to be discharged 
on a level with the orifice, the upper part of the tube should slide through 
another fixed to and standing above the bottom of the receiving cistern, 
that the liquid when once raised may not run back ; and, for the same 
reason, the tube should be inclined. Among other uses to which they 
are applicable is that of occasionally watering or washing trees and 
plants. In public gardens and other places, where a jet d'eau cannot 
otherwise be conveniently obtained, these instruments might be placed 
in a reservoir and moved by concealed mechanism, so as to produce one ; 
and although it would consist of a succession of jets, the movements might 
be so regulated that they would appear but one. The motion of the tube 
itself might also be hid, by making it play in the interior of a fixed one, 
above whose orifice it need not protrude. In this manner the air in fac- 
tories, hospitals, and rooms of private dwellings, might be kept cool, and, 
by perfuming the water, rendered very agreeable and refreshing in sultry 
weather. In fact, at every place where a fountain is desirable, a vase 
and spouting tube might be used. 

The experiments we have given are very imperfect, but they may serve 
to excite those persons who have leisure and opportunity to pursue the 
subject. This mode of raising water is deserving of a rigid investigation, 
and will amply repay all the labor expended upon it. 

There is a natural illustration of spouting tubes in the Souffleu?; or 
Blower, on the south side of the Mauritius. The action of the waves has 
undermined some rocks that run out into the sea from the main land, and 
has worn two passages that open vertically upwards. They are repre- 
sented " as smooth and cylindrical [conical ?] as if cut by a chisel." When 
a heavy sea rolls in, it fills in an instant the caverns underneath, and finding 
no other egress, a part is forced up the tubes to an elevation of sixty feet. 
The moment the waves recede, the vacuum left by them causes the wind 
to rush into the apertures with a noise that is heard at a considerable dis- 
tance. See a description of this phenomenon in the Saturday Magazine, 
vcl. vi. p. 77. 



Chap. 5.] Nature's devices far raising Water. 505 



CHAPTER V. 



Nature's devices for raising water— Their influence— More common than other natural operations— 
The globe a self-moving hydraulic engine— Streams flowing on its surface— Others ejected from its 
bowels— Subterranean cisterns, tubes and siphons— Intermitting springs— Natural rams and pressure 
engines— Eruption of water on the coast of Italy— Water raised in vapor— Clouds— Water raised by 
6team— Geysers — Earthquakes— Vegetation — Advantages of studying it— Erroneous views of future hap- 
piness — Circulation of sap — This fluid wonderfully varied in its effects and movements— Pitcher plant 
and Peruvian canes— Trees of Australia— Endosmosis — Waterspouts — Ascent of liquids by capillary 
attraction— Tenacity and other properties of liquids — Ascent of liquids up inclined planes — Liquid drops 
— Their uniform diffusion when not counteracted by gravity— Their form and size— Soft and hard 
soldering — Ascent of water in capillary tube3 limited only by its volume — Cohesion of liquids — Ascent 
of water through sand and rags— Rise of oil in lamp wicks and through the pores of boxwood 

Before taking leave of artificial machines for raising water, a few of the 
most prominent of those which nature employs may be noticed ; for, after 
all, the best of human contrivances are but imitations of hers. 

The extent to which raising of water is carried by nature is wonderful. 
Persons who have not reflected on the subject would hardly suspect the 
influence which this operation exerts on our globe ; yet it is one which 
the Creator has adopted to bring about results upon which the happiness 
of all things living depend. To the elevation of water into the atmosphere, 
and its return to the earth, the formation of continents and islands, lakes, 
rivers, fountains, valleys, plains, gravel, sand, mould, &c. are due. The 
fertility of soil, growth of vegetables, and life of animals, are also to be 
attributed in a greater or less degree to the same source. 

Of nature's machinery, devices to raise, diffuse and collect water are 
the most common. They pervade all her works — the most magnificent 
and the most minute : and if we turn our thoughts to the world at large 
and contemplate it as a whole, we find it performing the part of an immense 
hydraulic engine, one which never stops working, and whose energy never 
flags. In almost every point of view this feature is obvious. In its ex- 
terior our planet is rather aqueous than terrene. Three-fourths of its 
surface are sunk into basins and scooped into channels for the reception 
and transmission of water ; more than one-half is occupied by the ocean, 
the principal reservoir ; while the other half is intersected in every direc- 
tion by lakes, rivers, and rivulets innumerable, that convey the dispersed 
liquid back to the sea. The motion imparted to water also exhibits every 
degree of activity and agitation, from overwhelming torrents and moun- 
tainous waves, to the gentle shower that descends as if dropt through the 
finest cullender, and the placid stream that glides imperceptibly by. 
Sometimes we behold it running with the speed of a race horse, roar- 
ing among rapids, leaping over precipices and darting down cataracts — 
here dashed into spray, there churned into foam ; now winding in eddies 
and gyrating in whirlpools ; passing through channels whose paths are 
tortuous as those of a serpent, and shooting through others straight as an 
arrow. 

Open channels and reservoirs constitute, however, but a part of nature's 
hydraulic machinery. In the interior of the earth, are close and air-tight 
reservoirs, and tubes of every imaginable size and figure, and of incon- 

64 



506 Natural Siphons — Pressure Engines — Vapor. [Book V. 

ceivable strength. These receive and transmit liquid columns whose 
hydrostatic pressure would shiver the strongest conduits made by man, 
while the volumes of water that play within and pass through them render 
utterly insignificant all the products of artificial engines. We know that 
rivers sometimes discharge themselves into subterraneous tubes, which, 
transporting the fluid to a distance, again vomits it up. In this manner 
water is often conveyed to places where its appearance is difficult to 
account for, because of the level of all the neighboring regions being 
far below the aperture of discharge — this being sometimes on the summit 
of mountains, and often at their sides. 

But the transmission of water from one level to another through pipes, 
is one of the simplest operations in natural as it is in artificial hydraulics. 
The flexure of the tubes fabricated by nature convert some of them into 
siphons, and these often decant the contents of caverns in which water 
slowly accumulates. The liquid rises till it flows over the highest bend 
in the tube, and the siphon being thus charged continues in operation, like 
one of ours, until the reservoir that supplies it be emptied, or the contents 
reduced to a level with the external orifice of the discharging leg. The 
action then ceases until the cavern be again filled and the operation 
renewed. Hence intermitting springs, and some of those that ebb and 
flow. 

Natural machines analogous to water-rams, pressure engines, and foun- 
tains of compression are doubtless also in operation in the bowels of the 
earth. In the intricate and infinitely variegated chasms and fissures 
through which water is falling and gases collecting, the principles of these 
machines must necessarily be often excited, and on scales of magnitude 
calculated to strike us with awe. It is not improbable that some of those 
horrible eruptions mentioned in history and others that have occurred at 
sea without human witnesses were effected by machinery of this descrip- 
tion. The subaqueous eruption which occurred on the south-west coast 
of Italy, in 1831, was probably an example. A column of water, 800 
yards in circumference, was forced to an elevation of sixty feet, and an 
island formed of the solid materials displaced. 

But natural devices are not confined to such as raise liquids by the mo- 
mentum they acquire in flowing through tubes, or oscillating in waves, 
nor by the hydrostatic pressure of one volume transmitted by means of 
airs to another. There are some in which water is raised by solar heat. 
The liquid is converted into steam or vapor, in\vhich state it is rendered 
lighter than air, and consequently ascends. This may be considered as 
nature's favorite plan. It is in operation everywhere, and always. By it 
water is drawn from every part of the earth's surface — both sea and land, 
and by it oceans of the liquid are kept suspended above us in the form 
of clouds, until it again returns in showers of rain and drifts of hail and 
snow. Of the quantity thus elevated, we may form some rude idea from 
the calculations of Halley respecting that drawn daily from the surface of 
the Mediterranean, viz. between five and six millions of tons ! a result 
which he deduced from experiments. Every person knows that canals 
require an extra supply of water to meet the expenses of evaporation. 
By experiments on the canal of Languedoc in France, the annual quan- 
tity thus borne off was found to be nearly three feet in depth over its 
whole area. Clouds of vapor or steam are often observed hanging over 
marshy ground, until the wind rises and bears them away. In hot sea- 
sons copious steams may be seen ascending just after a shower ; but in 
general aqueous vapor thus generated, is invisible as it is impalpable. 
In clear weather, we are not sensible of its presence or of its movements* 



Chap. 5.] Water raised by Steam — Vegetable Kingdom. 507 

We literally live in it, as in the spray of a fountain, but our perceptions 
are too gross to detect it. 

How simple is this mode of raising water, and yet how effective ! How 
silently does it work, and yet how sure ! In its liquid state, water is too 
heavy to be suspended in the firmament ; hence the Creator has *made 
this provision to attenuate its particles by heat. It then rises upwards of 
its own accord — neither wheels nor cranks, pumps, pistons, pipes, nor 
even power is required to send them up, or to keep them there ; and yet 
billions of tons are rising every hour, and accumulating in masses so 
great as to baffle language to describe or thought to grasp. And, what 
is equally remarkable, neither cisterns are required to contain, nor con- 
duits through which to convey them. The phenomenon teaches us how 
a heavier fluid may be suspended in a lighter one, and that the proposition 
of water being 800 times heavier than air, is only conditionally true — 
depending merely upon the state in which those fluids are ordinarily 
exhibited to us. To increase our admiration, the salt water of the ocean 
is during the process of elevation distilled into fresh, thus furnishing 
among other suggestions that by which navigators have often adopted to 
sustain life in the extremities of thirst. 

Water is also continually being converted into vapor and urged into 
the atmosphere by subterranean heat. Our planet may be considered, 
as indeed it was by the ancients, as a cauldron, in which steam is gene- 
rated by those fires whose flues are volcanos. Oceans of the liquid are 
incessantly but silently thrown up from this cause. But, as might be 
expected, from the intricate arrangement of internal chambers and channels 
of communication, steam must often accumulate in cavities until its elasticity 
drives up the water that seals the passage to the surface. Hence boiling 
and thermal springs, and hence also the hot spouting springs of Iceland. 
According to Olafsen, a Danish traveler, one of the Geysers exhibited a 
jet at one time 19 feet in diameter and 360 feet high ! 

Modern authors explain the phenomenon of earthquakes by the accu- 
mulation of steam in the bowels of the earth. Plutarch says the Stoic 
philosophers did the same ; but long before Zeno appeared the opinion 
prevailed, and caused the epithet " shaker of the earth" to be given to 
Neptune. The mechanical as well as chemical operations going on within 
the earth, are wonderful in their nature and terrible in extent. Well 
might mythologists locate the workshops of the gods there, and place the 
forges of Vulcan and the Cyclops at the base of volcanos. 

Of contrivances for raising liquids, as developed in the organization of 
animals, we took some notice in the second and third books. Most if not 
all of them maybe considered modifications of bellows and piston pumps. 
In the vegetable kingdom, other devices, and such as are based on other 
principles, are in active operation. This portion of creation exhibits in a 
striking light the important part which devices for raising water perform 
in the constitution of our globe. Every tree and every plant, from the 
towering cedar of Lebanon, to the hyssop that springeth out of the wall, 
from the wide-spreading banyan to a wheaten straw or melon vine, is a 
natural pump, through whose tubes water is drawn from the earth or 
imbibed from the air. 

There is something exceedingly pleasing and sublime in the contempla- 
tion of the growth of vegetables, the germination of seeds, appearance of 
sprouts, development of stems, branches, leaves, buds, blossoms, flowers, 
and fruits — their variegated forms, dimensions, movements, colors, and 
odors. Some persons who have never turned their attention to this subject 
till the evening of their days, have been astonished at the wonders which 



508 Ascent of Sap. [Book V. 

burst on their view. A new state of existence seemed to open upon them. 
Their perception and estimate of things were changed. Instead of con- 
sidering the world as calculated only for what man too generally makes 
it — a scene for the display and gratification of the most groveling and 
sordid passions, they find it a theatre crowded with enchanting specimens 
of the Creator's skill, the study of which imparts the sweetest pleasure, 
and the knowledge of which constitutes the greatest wealth. 

Those pious but mistaken people, who incessantly murmur against the 
world, and long to depart from " this howling wilderness," as they are 
pleased to term it, reproach their Maker by reviling his work. They are 
waiting for future displays of his glory, and neglect those ravishing ones 
by which they are surrounded, forgetting that " the whole earth is full of 
his glory" — looking for sources of pleasure to come, and closing their 
eyes on those before them — thirsting for the waters of heaven, and despis- 
ing the living fountains which the Father of all intellects has opened for 
them on earth. They seem to think happiness hereafter will not depend 
upon knowledge, or that knowledge will be acquired without effort — a 
kind of passive enjoyment, independent of the exercise of their intellectual 
or spiritual energies. But they have no ground to hope for any such thing. 
Reasoning from analogy and the nature of mind, the happiness of spirits 
must consist in being imbued with a love of nature — in contemplating the 
wisdom and other attributes of the Deity, as they are unfolded in the works 
of creation. In what else can it consist? It is not probable that human or 
finite beings of any class can ever know God except through the medium 
of his works. 

It is admitted that the study of nature is a source of exquisite pleasure 
to intelligent beings, and the most refined one too that the mind can con- 
ceive : it is also one that can never be exhausted. Those persons, therefore, 
who take no pleasure in examining the works of creation here, are little 
prepared to enter upon more extensive and scrutinizing views of them in 
other worlds. If they have no relish for an acquaintance with the Crea- 
tor's works while they live, they have no right to expect new tastes for 
them after death. The works of God are all perfect ; those in this world 
as well as those in others ; and he that can look with apathy on a tulip 
or a rose, a passion flower or a lily, or any other production of a flower 
garden or a forest, has not begun to live. Besides, we are not sure that 
other worlds possess more captivating or more ennobling subjects for 
contemplation and research — more thrilling proofs of the wisdom and 
beneficence of God. 

The circulation of sap (sometimes called the blood of plants) is one of 
the most interesting of natural phenomena. It is connected with some of 
the most delightful feelings of our nature, and with the activity and joys 
of the brute creation. When in spring its action commences, a sensation 
of buoyancy pervades all organized beings. The earth begins to put on 
her richest attire — her inhabitants rejoice in her approaching splendor, and 
exult in view of the feasts preparing for them. On the other hand, when 
in autumn her freshness fades and her glory withers, all feel the change. 
How infinitely varied are the effects of sap and the energy of its move- 
ments ! Rushing to the summit of the tallest trees, and lingering in the 
grass of our meadows — shooting up perpendicularly in the poplar and 
pine, horizontally in the branches of the baobab and oak, and descend- 
ing in those of the Indian fig-tree and willow. In some plants, accumu- 
^ting chiefly in their roots, as in the turnip, radish, and potato, and 
emerging above ground in cucumbers and melons — ascending higher in 
the bushes of currants and gooseberries, and ranging over those in apple 



Chap. 5.] Natural Pitchers — Trees in Australia. 509 

and pear trees. By what wonderful process is sap distilled into liquid 
honey in the maple, and into wine in the grape 1 How is it elaborated 
into fruits of every flavor, and exhaled in perfumes from sweet scented 
herbs, and in what manner does it contribute to produce every imaginable 
color and tint in flowers 1 x 

By what means does sap form a natural vase in the pitcher plant, and 
then enter it as limpid water, along with rain and dew 1 This singular 
production of the vegetable kingdom collects water from the earth and 
atmosphere in vessels of the same consistence and color as the leaves. 
Each pitcher is strengthened by a hoop, and furnished with a cover or lid 
that turns on a fibrous hinge. When dew or rain falls, this cover opens ; 
and as soon as the weather clears, it closes and prevents the water that 
entered from being wasted by evaporation. There are other plants which 
store tfp water much in the same way. Such were the reeds that relieved 
Alvarado (one of the conquerors of Peru) and his companions from perish- 
ing of.-.-thirst. Garcilasso, in his Commentaries observes, " The infor- 
mation they had of the water was from the people of the country, who 
guided them to the canes, some of which contained six gallons, and some 
more." 

We know that the juices of plants cannot be raised without force, and 
that this force must be increased with the elevation to which the liquid is 
to be lifted. Animals exert a muscular power in working the pumps 
formed in their bodies, and these machines they put in motion at will. 
This is not the case with vegetables : yet sap, the pabulum of their life, 
is elevated to the tops of the highest trees, and apparently with the same 
facility as it is diffused through microscopic plants. That the force by 
which this is done is not latent or negative in its nature, is clear, since it 
may easily be rendered manifest. Cut a branch from a vine in the spring 
when the sap is rising, and stretch a piece of india rubber over the end 
of the part that remains, secure it by thread wound round the stump, so 
as to exclude the air and prevent the wound from healing. In a little 
while the caoutchouc will be swelled or bulged out oj the exuding 
fluid, and it will continue to swell, however thick it may be, till it burst. 
A few years ago we treated in this way some branches of an Isabella 
grape vine, and afterwards applied to one of them a close vessel contain- 
ing mercury, in which the lower end of a long glass tube was immersed 
with a view to measure the force excited. In four days the mercury 
rose 36 inches in the tube, being pushed up by the sap which took its 
place in the vessel ; and but for an accident, by which the apparatus was 
broken, it would probably have ascended still higher. 

But this force, great as it was, is small when compared with that which 
sends the fluid through trees that grow on the Australian continent and 
islands. Some of these resemble single tubes, and are filled with a semi- 
fluid or soft pith. Tasman, the discoverer of Van Dieman's Land, found 
trees there whose lowest branches were between 60 and 70 feet above the 
ground. The French expedition sent in search of the lamented Perouse, 
found on Cocos island a tree nearly 100 feet high, and only three inches 
in diameter. It was of so hard a texture, that it resisted at first the 
heaviest blows of an axe ; and when the pith was taken out, the thick* 
ness of the wood did not exceed -^ of an inch — forming a perfect tube. 
But this tree was only half the height of some others in the same regions ; 
for several were seen whose diameters were only seven or eight inches, 
and whose tops towered upwards of 200 feet above the earth ! The force 
that drives sap to such elevations is wonderful indeed ; and could it be 
applied as a mechanical agent, it would be resistless as steam. It might 



510 Water Spouts — Capillary Attraction. [Book V, 

be supposed that a force so energetic — one that would rupture pipes 
which convey water to our dwellings — would rend asunder most of the 
delicate pores through which it circulates ; and so it would were not their 
diameter so exceedingly small — for the strength of tubes increases as their 
bore is diminished. 

The ascent of sap has been explained by Endosmosis, or transit of bodies 
through pores. See two interesting papers on this subject in the Journal 
of the Franklin Institute, vols, xvii and xviii, by J. W. Draper, now Prof, 
of Chemistry in the New- York University. 

Water Spouts constitute a peculiar class of nature's contrivances for 
raising water. Electricity is supposed to have a controlling influence in 
their formation ; but the mode by which it acts is not clearly understood. 
More water is drawn up by them within the same space of time than by 
any other natural device. The liquid appears to be borne up the *vortex 
mechanically as solid substances are raised by whirlwinds, except that 
it is broken by masses of air rushing into and mixing with it. After 
arriving at the top of the spout, it is dispersed by lateral currents of wind. 
A drop of water suspended from the conductor of an electrifying machine 
is supposed to exhibit a miniature water spout. When a vessel of water 
is placed under it, and the machine put in operation, the drop assumes 
the various appearances of a spout in its rise, form, and mode of disap- 
pearance. Clouds act as cisterns in holding water raised by evaporation ; 
but in water spouts they perform a more singular part, since they are 
moulded into visible pipes, through which volumes of liquid are conveyed 
as securely as through those made of solid materials. 

Although the rise of sap in trees is attributed to endosmosis, there is 
reason to believe that capillary attraction takes part in the process, as 
well as in a thousand other operations of nature. When one end of a 
small glass tube is placed in water, the liquid rises within it ; and the 
height to which it ascends in different tubes, is inversely as their diame- 
ters. The phenomenon is more or less common to all liquids when the 
tubes dipped in them are made of such materials as they readily unite 
with. This condition is necessary, otherwise the liquid would be de- 
pressed. Water rises higher than other liquids in glass tubes ; and as 
these instruments are transparent, they are always adopted in experiments 
on this subject. 

The phenomenon of capillarity has exercised the ingenuity and learn- 
ing of the most eminent philosophers, and various are the causes to which 
they have attributed it. Some supposed the atmospheric pressure less 
within the tubes than without. Others imagined an unknown fluid cir- 
culating through them that bore the liquid up ; and some ascribed it to 
moisture on the inside of the tubes. An attractive force existing between 
the glass and the water is now more generally admitted ; and hence in 
tubes of very small bore, it is said, the glass being nearer the water, at- 
tracts it more powerfully, i. e. raises it higher — other writers think the 
effect is due to electricity. The subject is admitted to be an intricate one, 
and the manner in which it has been handled by scientific men, has not 
rendered it very accessible to ordinary readers. Without looking for 
ultimate causes, the phenomenon, like that of an increased discharge, 
through diverging ajutages, may be traced to the relative properties of 
the liquid and the material of the tube, and to the force with which 
particles of liquids cohere among themselves. 

Capillary attraction is exhibited in a great variety of forms. Particles 
of water, like those of all other liquids, require some force to separate 
them. A needle or film of lead while dry, will float ; and myriads of 



Chap. 5.] Forms of Drops. 511 

gnats career on the surface of a pond as securely as on land. Some 
liquids are viscid, and may be drawn into threads ; and even water may 
be stretched into sheets ere its substance be broken : bubbles produced 
during rains, and those pellicles sometimes formed over the mouths of 
small vials and the interstices of sieves are examples. Water, moreover, 
in common with other fluids, unites with some substances more readily 
than with others. It does not combine with oils, nor adhere to substances 
impregnated with grease. Hence umbrellas and water-proof dresses are 
made of oiled silk ; and rain rolls off the backs of ducks and other aquatic 
birds without wetting them, because these fowls dress their feathers with 
an unctuous fluid which their bodies secrete. 

When a vessel contains a liquid that readily unites with it, the liquid 
stands highest at the edges. Thus in cups of tea or tumblers of water, 
the fluid climbs up against the sides until it is considerably elevated above 
the general level. This is observable with milk in a pot, pitch in a caul- 
dron, oil in cans, mercury in vessels lined with an amalgam ; melted tin 
in tinned iron or copper vessels, and fused brass in an iron ladle whose 
interior has been coated with the alloy, as in the process of hard soldering. 
If, on the other hand, a liquid has no affinity for, or will not unite with 
the substance of which the vessel is made, an effect the reverse is pro- 
duced ; that is, the liquid is depressed at the sides, as when mercury is 
contained in a vessel of glass, wood, or earthen ware ; or even in one of 
metal not lined with an amalgam, or with which the mercury cannot form 
one. The same thing occurs to fused brass, or lead or tin in crucibles, to 
water in greasy tubes or dishes, &c. 

The same thing, in another form, occurs with drops of liquid. When 
water is sprinkled on a greasy surface, the particles remain separate how- 
ever near to each other. By blowing against them, they may be rolled 
over the plate on which they rest without leaving any portion behind ; 
but if the substance on which they are dropped combine readily with 
moisture their figure is changed ; each becomes flattened by spreading, 
so that two adjacent drops quickly run together. A drop of oil or speck 
of grease makes a large stain on a lady's dress or a marble table. Quick- 
silver will not unite with marble, but a small portion dropped on a sheet 
of tin will spread over it like water on damp paper. A portion of tin- 
men's solder kept in fusion on clean plates of tin or lead spreads, and is 
absorbed in like manner. When ink is spilt upon unsized paper, the lat- 
ter is stained to a considerable extent : round each drop a broad ring of 
moisture is formed; the darker and grosser particles remaining as a 
nucleus in the centre. 

The different forms which drops assume when pendent from solid 
bodies, are governed by the parts with which they are in contact. When 
water is sprinkled on a plate partly covered with grease, those particles 
that fall on the clean parts resemble very flat segments of spheres, while 
those on the greased parts are larger portions of smaller spheres ; the 
liquid in these swelling out above the base on which they rest, in pre- 
ference to extending itself like the others upon it. A drop hanging from 
the point of a wire is elongated vertically — if held between the finger 
and thumb, it may be stretched out horizontally. If suspended in a ring, 
its upper surface becomes hollow and its lower .one convex, forming a 
species of liquid cup, and supported somewhat like the dishes which che- 
mists hang over lamps in moveable rings of brass. A drop of liquid in a 
capillary tube is thus supported ; the tube being nothing more than a 
deep ring. 

The quantity of liquid contained in pendent drops varies with the 



512 Ascent of Liquids against Gravity. [Book V. 

extent of surface in contact with the supporting body. When one is ready 
to fall from an inclined object, as the bottom of a bucket or a tea cup, it 
may be retained by making the bottom approach nearer to a level ; the 
fluid then spreads and holds by a larger surface. This is illustrated in 
the case of metals : tin-plate workers commonly take up solder on the 
face of their irons. The under sides of these instruments are tinned, 
and being placed upon the metal, a larger or smaller portion is melted 
and borne off at pleasure. An equal quantity of water may probably be 
thus suspended from a plane surface, as within a cylinder of the same 
area. 

Numerous facts show, that when not pulled down by gravity, liquids 
diffuse themselves uniformly on substances with which they combine — as 
much upwards as downwards. Small drops of water or ink dashed 
against vertical sheets of paper equally extend themselves from the 
centre. We are so much in the habit of contemplating, fluids in masses, 
where gravitation greatly preponderates, that we overlook this property 
in them, or do not suspect its existence. The observation that water 
never runs " up hill" is proverbial, but it is not correct. Examples might 
be quoted, in which it prefers to ascend an inclined plane to going down 
one — to rise in a wet channel, than descend in a dry one. Take a dry 
piece of glass, or china, the blade of a knife, or the bottom of a saucer, or 
almost any solid material, and dampen or slightly wet a part of it : place 
a drop of ink or water near the edge of the wetted part, then incline the 
saucer so that the drop may be beneath, and make a channel of com- 
munication between them, by drawing with a pointed instrument a small 
streak of fluid from one to the other. The instant this is done, a cur- 
rent will set up with considerable velocity from the drop into the thin 
sheet above. 

This effect takes place on wood and on metals, and even paper. Pen- 
men, who have their paper inclined towards them often witness the 
experiment in another form, especially when they make the bottom of 
their strokes thicker than the rest. The ink may then be seen to ascend 
from the bottom upon the removal of the pen. This takes place if the 
paper be held vertically. Again, when a large drop of ink falls on a 
book, it is customary to shake out that which remains in the pen, and to 
place the latter over the drop as in the act of writing ; upon which a large 
portion of the liquid enters the quill. This is then shaken, and the opera- 
tion renewed. Here the principle of distribution again appears. There 
is a surplus below, and a deficiency (or less depth of it) above, and the 
liquid ascends to produce an equilibrium. Were the pen fully charged 
with ink before applied to the drop, it could take none from the latter. 

Other examples of the ascent of liquids, and even of solids against 
gravity are familiar to some classes of mechanics, but not to all. When 
two sheets of tin plate are soldered together in an inclined position, small 
pieces of solder laid near the lower edge of the joint are drawn up under 
the face of the iron as soon as the fused mass touches them. Illustrations 
of this occur in whatever position the joint may be. They are still more 
common in hard soldering, for copper and silversmiths commonly charge 
their joints on the outside, so that the solder is below or next to the fire 
when fused. 

These experiments are all based on the same principles as the ascent 
of water in capillary tubes. We see that when a mass of liquid (wholly 
resting on a plane surface or enclosed in a cylinder) is connected by a 
short channel to a thin sheet of the same substance above, a part of the 
mass below will ascend. The channel it should be remembered is a fluid 



Chap. 5.] Cohesion of Liquids. 513 

one, for neither water nor any other liquid will thus rise except in channels 
of the same substance as themselves. The effect does not therefore appear 
to be due wholly to the material that sustains the liquid, but, to some ex- 
tent, to that force by which particles of matter congregate with their kind 
in preference to mingling with others. The aqueous vapor floating in the 
atmosphere moistens more or less the surfaces of all bodies. Glass tubes 
are coated with it ; but if a capillary tube previous to its use was not thus 
prepared, it becomes so the instant one end is immersed in water — a 
stream of vapor (though not obvious to sight) then passes through it : the 
whole interior is thus coated with aqueous moleculse accumulating upon 
it at insensible distances from each other, and those adjacent to the surface 
of the liquid operate to solicit its ascent through the channel thus prepared 
for it. The ascent of vapor under these circumstances is unlimited, but 
that of a liquid column is soon arrested. This however does not prove that 
the force excited is insufficient to raise liquids to great elevations, but that 
it is the volume which determines the height. If the quantity be indefi- 
nitely small it will be raised indefinitely high. Experiments so far as 
they have been made prove this ; but as the finest of artificial tubes are, 
when compared to nature's, as a mast is to a needle or a cable to a thread, 
the ascent of liquids in them must necessarily be very limited. As long 
as the liquid column can be sustained by adhesion to the sides of a tube 
it will rise, but when the weight of the central parts (which not being 
attached to the tube are sustained by cohesion alone) exceeds this force, 
the ascent ceases. 

The force with which particles of some fluids cohere is so energetic 
that they present the singular spectacle of liquid rods, pendent like icicles 
or, stalactites. When one of these rods is broken an interesting contest 
between gravitation and cohesion takes place, during which the figure of 
the pendent changes as one or the other of those forces prevails : it 
becomes longer while the first predominates, shorter when the latter 
controls, and stationary when both are balanced. These phenomena may 
be observed by letting a drop of molasses fall from the point of a knife 
or a spoon. The globule descends to a considerable distance before it is 
wholly separated from the portion above, because a rod of the liquid 
continues to be formed that unites them. When this rod breaks, the part 
suspended from the mass above is drawn up : a thread over a foot in length 
is sometimes thus contracted to less than \ of an inch, strongly remind- 
ing one of the elasticity of caoutchouc. 

Water rises to considerable heights through sand and other porous 
bodies — also through rags and threads of cotton, &c. Oil ascends in the 
wicks of lamps. Capillary siphons formed of cotton wick are employed 
to supply oil to the journals and working parts of machinery. It is cus- 
tomary with stereotype founders to oil the faces of engraved wooden blocks 
previous to taking casts from them. These blocks are of box, a species 
of wood whose texture is exceedingly close. We have often placed some 
of those used in the illustration of this work on receiving them from the 
engraver, into a dish containing oil to the depth of \ inch, and have wit- 
nessed the appearance of the liquid at the top within half a minute, and 
frequently in a quarter of one. Unlike water in glass tubes, the oil here 
rises entirely out of the tubes in the wood and collects in globules over the 
orifices. 

From the infinite variety and importance of devices for raising liquids 
that are at work in the animal and vegetable kingdoms and in general 
nature, the wisdom displayed in their formation and movements, and their 
wonderful effects, it would seem as if the Creator designed particularly 

65 



514 Siphons. [Book V. 

to call man's attention to this department of knowledge, and to induce 
him to cultivate it. 

Sources of hydraulic contrivances and of mechanical movements are 
endless in nature ; and if machinists would but study in her school, she 
would lead them to the adoption of the best principles, and the most 
suitable modifications of them in every possible contingency. 



CHAPTER VI 



Siphons — Mode of charging them — Principle on which their action depends — Cohesion of liquids — 
Siphons act in vacuo — Variety of siphons — Their antiquity — Of Eastern origin — Portrayed in the tombs 
at Thebes — Mixed wines — Siphons in ancient Egyptian kitchens — Probably used at the feast at Cana — 
Their application by old jugglers — Siphons from Heron's Spiritalia — Tricks with liquids of different 
specific gravities — Fresh water dipped from the surface of the sea — Figures of Tantalus' cups — Tricks 
of old publicans — Magic pitcher — Goblet for unwelcome visiters — Tartar necromancy with cups — Roman 
baths — Siphons used by the ancients for tasting wine — Siphons, A. D. 1511 — Figures of modern siphons — 
Sucking tube — Valve siphon — Tin plate — Wirtemburg siphon — Argand's siphon — Chemists' siphons — 
Siphons by the author — Wacer conveyed over extensive grounds by siphons— Limit of the applkation 
of siphons known to ancient Plumbers — Error of Porta and other writers respecting siphons — Decaus- 
Siphons for discharging liquids at the bend — Ram siphon. 

The siphon, or as it is sometimes named the crane, is in its simplest 
form merely a tube bent so as to resemble an inverted letter Uor V; and 
is employed to transfer liquids from one level to a lower one, in circum- 
stances where natural or artificial obstructions prevent a straight pipe 
from being used ; as when rocks or rising grounds intervene between a 
spring and the place where the water is required, or when the contents 
of casks and other vessels are to be withdrawn without making openings 
for the purpose in their bottom or sides. Thus farmers occasionally have 
water conveyed over hills to supply their barn-yards and dwellings ; and 
portable siphons are in constant requisition with oil and liquor merchants, 
chemists and distillers. The two branches of a tube that constitute a 
siphon are commonly of unequal lengths, and named legs ; the " short" or 
receiving leg, and the " long" or discharging one. The highest part where 
the legs are united is known as the apex or bend. 

As liquids are raised in siphons by atmospheric pressure, the perpen- 
dicular length of the short leg, like the suction pipe of a pump, should 
never exceed 25 or 28 feet. To put siphons in operation, the air within 
them must be first expelled. Small ones are sometimes inverted and 
filled with a portion of the fluid to be decanted, but more frequently the 
liquid is drawn through the tube by sucking. Other devices for charging 
them will be noticed farther on. 

The action of a siphon does not depend upon any inequality of atmo- 
spheric pressure, as some writers on natural philosophy have inadvertently 
intimated. In one popular work, it is said, " the pressure of the air is 
more diminished ;" and in another, more " weakened or abated" over the 
discharging than over the receiving orifice ; whereas, philosophically 
speaking, the reverse is the fact : for as the discharging end is nearer the 
earth, a deeper and consequently heavier column of atmosphere rests over 




Chap. 6.] Variety of their forms and materials. 515 

it than over the other. Nor does the effect depend upon any difference 
in the actual lengths of the legs, for they are often in this respect the 
same ; and sometimes the receiving one is much longer (in an oblique 
direction) than the other — not yet does their comparative diameters con- 
tribute to the results ; for the short one may be much more capacious 
than the long one. It is the difference in the perpendicular length of the 
liquid columns within the legs that causes a siphon to act : the column in the 
discharging leg must exceed in this respect that contained 
in the receiving one, or no action can take place. By 
examining the figure' in the margin, it will be perceived 
that the column in the receiving leg extends only from the 
surface of the liquid in the vessel to the bend, whereas in 
the other it extends from the bend to the orifice. As the 
pressure of fluids is as their depth without regard to their 
volume, the hydrostatic equilibrium of the two columns is 
destroyed, when the longer one necessarily preponderates, 
upon which the vacuity left in the upper part of the tube 
is filled, by the atmosphere driving fresh portions up the 
No. 234. other leg. 

But siphons could not act at all were it not for that 
property of fluids by which their particles cling to each other. The tena- 
city of liquids may be considered like that of solids, only less intense ; 
and thus it is when water flows through a siphon, the descending particles 
actually drag down those above them, somewhat like a chain or rope 
unequally suspended over a pulley, when the longer end pulls the shorter 
one after it. A siphon is in fact a contrivance by which liquid chains or 
ropes are thus made to act. But for the cohesion of liquids the contents 
of the discharging leg would drop out like sand, and no further effect 
would follow — the rope would be broken, and the separated parts fall 
asunder. The influence of cohesion in the action of siphons is proved by 
the fact that very short ones continue to operate when removed into a 
vacuum* 

The tenacity, or what might almost be called the malleability of liquids, 
is beautifully exemplified in soap bubbles. These yield to impressions 
without breaking. They fall on and rebound from the floor like bladders 
or balls of india rubber. They shake in the wind, and their figures be- 
come altered like that of balloons tossed to and fro in the air : all this they 
often endure before their shells are broken by evaporation. 

Siphons are exceedingly diversified in their forms, materials and uses. 
They are made of cylindrical and other shaped tubes, and both of uniform 
and irregular bore. The legs of some are parallel, while in others they 
meet at every angle — sometimes straight and often crooked — one may be 
larger than the other, or both may be alike ; they also may be separate, 
one loosely slipping into or over the other. Instead of tubes siphons are 
sometimes formed by an arrangement of plates, and also by a combination 
of vases. This plastic property has occasioned their concealment in more 
various forms than Proteus ever assumed. Siphons are made of tin, cop- 
per, iron, silver, glass, lead, earthenware, leather, wood, canes ; and 
(capillary ones) of paper, strips of cloth, threads of cotton, &c. Examples 
of their various forms and applications will be found noticed in the follow- 
ing historical sketch. 

The origin of siphons like that of pumps is lost in antiquity. Some 

a For information on the action of siphons in vacuo, see Boyle's Works, by Shaw, 
vol. ii. 446. History and Memoirs of the French Academy, translated by Martin and 
Chambers, vol. iv. 374 ; and Desaguliers Exper. Philos. vol. ii. 168. 



516 



Siphons in Ancient Egypt. 



[Book V. 



writers of the last century attributed them to Ctesibius, (see page 268,) 
because they were used in some of his water-clocks, and no earlier appli- 
cation of them was then known. For the same reason the invention of 
toothed wheels has been erroneously ascribed to him. All the informa- 
tion extant respecting the ancient nations of the East is exceedingly 
limited, while of their arts and details of their mechanism we know next 
to nothing. The greater part of our ordinary machines cannot be traced 
to a higher source than Greece, but Greece itself was colonized by Egyp- 
tians ; and however much the children of Cadmus may have refined on 
some departments of the useful arts, the general mechanism of their 
ancestors is believed to have passed through their hands to those of the 
Romans, and from the latter to us with little alteration. This was cer- 
tainly the case with their hydraulic and hydro-pneumatic devices. The 
siphon is an example. The name of this instrument is taken from a Greek 
word, which signifies simply a tube ; but it has been ascertained that the 
word is of a remoter — of an oriental origin, being derived from siph or 
sif, to imbibe or draw up with the breath, and whence comes our expres- 
sion to sip. Now if it can be proved that the siphon was in use, and was 
charged by sucking before the times of Grecian history, we may safely 
conclude that a more ancient people furnished the Greeks with both the 
instrument and its name. 

The researches of Rosellini and Wilkinson have settled this point. 
These gentlemen have brought to light irresistible evidence that siphons 
were used in Egypt at least as early as 1450 years before Christ. In a 
tomb at Thebes, which bears the name of Amunoph II, who reigned at 
the period just named, they are delineated, and in a manner too distinct 
to admit of any doubts. See No. 235. Several jars are represented 
upon a frame or stand. Into three of them siphons are inserted ; two 
apparently in operation, and a man is in the act of charging the other by 
sucking : the contents of the jars being transferred into a large vase sup- 
ported upon an ornamental stand. 




No. 235. Egyptian siphous, 1450, B. C. 



No. 236. 



Mr. Wilkinson supposes that siphons were invented in Egypt, and were 
used to decant the Nile water from one vessel to another. He says it is 
necessary to let this water stand for some time before being used, that the 
mud suspended in it may settle to the bottom. On this account vases 
containing it cannot be moved without rendering it again turbid, and the 
same effect is produced by dipping ; hence the use of siphons. The con- 



Chap. 6.] Common in Kitchens. 517 

jecture may be correct, but it does not derive much support from the 
use of those instruments figured at No. 235 ; for unless there was some 
contrivance to prevent the ends of the siphons from going too near the 
bottom of the jars, scarcely any thing would more effectually disturb and 
, draw off the sediment with the water. The tubes were obviously of 
some flexible material, and from the manner in which they are held, it 
would be impossible for the person using them to regulate by hand the 
depth to which the short legs were immersed. Moreover, another indi- 
vidual (omitted in our illustration) is represented pouring a liquid into 
one of the jars, an operation that would effectually disturb the sediment. 

Instead of water, jars so small probably contained wines, and the artist 
designed to exhibit the mode of mixing them ; a common practice of old, 
and one referred to in several parts of the scriptures. The Egyptians 
were much given to luxurious living, and especially with regard to wine, 
a fact which the sculptures corroborate, for scenes of gross excess, and in 
females too, are portrayed. The Jews we know carried with them into 
Palestine not only the arts but many of the worst habits of the Egyptians, 
and the excessive indulgence of mixed wines was one. "Woe unto them 
that are mighty to drink wine, and men of strength to mingle strong 
drink." Isaiah v, 22. " She hath mingled her wine, she hath also furnished 
her table." Prov. ix, 2. " They that tarry long at the wine, they that 
go to seek mixed wine." Ibid xxiii, 30. 

Other examples of the early use of siphons are met with. In the tomb 
of Remeses III. who flourished 1235 B. C, is a representation of an 
Egyptian kitchen, with the various operations of slaying animals, cutting 
up the joints and preparing them for cooking — kneading dough with the 
feet, and paste with the hands — making cakes and confectionary, &c. — 
Of kitchen furniture, there are tables, jars, plates, cauldrons, bellows, 
ovens, molds, pestle and mortar, knives, baskets, &c, and suspended 
on ropes or rods, a number of siphons ; showing evidently that those 
instruments were in constant requisition. See No. 236. These were 
probably adapted for jars of certain depths, unlike those in the preceding 
figure, which seem to have been appropriated to different sized vessels, 
and their shape altered as occasions might require. 

How singular that these philosophical instruments should have been 
more common before the siege of Troy than at the present day ! And 
how precious are those monumental records that have preserved this and 
other facts of the kind ! 

The circumstance of siphons having been used in Egypt at so early a 
period may be deemed conclusive that other nations were not ignorant of 
them. With Egypt, all the famous people of antiquity maintained an 
intercourse ; and enterprising men flocked from all parts to acquire a 
knowledge of the arts and sciences that were cultivated on the banks of 
the Nile. Their neighbours, the Jews, as a matter of course, were ac- 
quainted with siphons, and there is probably a reference to them in John 
ii. " Jesus saith unto them, fill the water pots with water. And they 
filled them to the brim. And he said unto them, draw out now and bear 
unto the governor of the feast, and they bare it." How did they draw 
this liquid % Certainly not by inclining the jars and pouring it out ; nor 
yet does it appear to have been done by dipping : for as the large pots 
were filled to the very brim, this would have caused the liquid to over- 
flow. It is more reasonable to suppose that small siphons were used on 
the occasion, and that they were charged by sucking, as represented in 
No. 235. This and this only clearly accounts for the fact that those who 
drew the liquid were first aware, as they must have been, of the change it 



518 



Siphons from Heron'' s Spiritalia. 



[BookV. 



being wine, 
made wine, 



had undergone. This change does not seem to have affected the color, 
for not till he tasted of it was the presiding officer himself sensible of its 
" When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was 
he " knew not whence it was, but the servants that drew the 
water knew." 

No. 235 probably was designed to represent one of Pharaoh's butlers 
engaged in that part of his duty which required him to draw and mix the 
king's drink. Such officers formed part of large establishments among 
the ancients, and so they do in modern times. Switzer, speaking of small 
siphons observes, " the insinuation of air is such that wine will not always 
keep on its regular ascent, without the butler puts his mouth sometimes to 
it, to give it a new suction." 

One of the modes by which Ctesibius applied siphons to clepsydrae, 
will be found figured in a subsequent chapter. 

Were the old philosophers of Egypt acquainted with the principle on 
which the siphon acts 1 Doubtless they were, else they could never have 
diversified its form and adapted it with such admirable ingenuity to the 
great variety of purposes both open and concealed, which we know they 
did. In connection with hydromancy it was made to play an important 
part. Magical goblets were often nothing else than modifications of siphons ; 
and from the Spiritalia we learn that they formed the basis of more com- 
plex and imposing apparatus. The tricks connected with the glass tomb 
of Belus, and the miraculous vases in the temple of Bacchus probably 
depended upon siphons ; and most writers on the vocal statue of Memnon 
have introduced them as essential parts of the supposed machinery ; imi- 
tating in this respect the apparatus described by Heron for producing 
mysterious sounds from the figures of men, birds, &c. 

Heron is more diffuse on the subject of siphons than any other writer, 
Upwards of twenty problems in his Spiritalia relate to or are illustrrated 
by them ; and from him we learn that these instruments were in his time 
employed on a large scale in draining and irrigating land, viz. by transfer- 
ring water over hills from one valley to another. This use of the siphon 
was probably quite as common under the Pharaohs as under the Ptolemies; 
for Heron does not intimate that it was novel in his time any more than 
the instrument itself. 




]> ! 



No. 237. No. 233. No. 239. No. 240. 

The above figures are illustrations of the first, second, third, and thirtieth 
•oblems of Heron's work. 



Chap. 6.] Liquids of different Specific Gravities. 519 

No. 237 (the first figure in the Spiritalia) represents an ordinary siphon 
resting - over the handle of a vase, within which the short leg is inserted. 
This instrument was charged by sucking, as the more ancient ones in the 
last cut. 

No. 238 exhibits another form of the siphon, consisting of two straight 
and separate tubes, the smaller one of which is inserted through the bot- 
tom of the covered vase, and reaches as high within it as the liquid is 
required to stand. Over this tube another one is slipped whose upper 
end is closed air-tight. Hence it is obvious that when the liquid is higher 
than the orifice of the inner tube which forms the long leg, it will ascend 
between the tubes and continue to be discharged as in the common siphon, 
until the surface descends below the lower end of the outer tube, or short 
leg. Here the liquid is discharged from the bottom of the vessel, not 
over its rim as in the preceding figure. The siphon admits of a great 
variety of modifications, some of which in the hands of ancient jugglers 
contributed not a little to amaze the ignorant. The contents of the large 
vases, often permanently fixed in temples, could and doubtless often were 
secretly emptied by contrivances of this kind ; the siphons of course being 
concealed in the ornaments, handles, or other adjuncts. The six vessels 
of wine placed daily in the temple of Bel, which the priests clandestinely 
emptied every night, might have been more neatly robbed of their contents 
by concealed siphons, than by entering through a secret passage under the 
altar ; but as the abstraction of the more solid food which the priests pre- 
tended was consumed every day by the brazen deity, (forty sheep and 
twelve measures of floor,) required some contrivance like the latter ; the 
vases were emptied at the same time. [Story of Bel and the Dragon.] 
The romantic account by Herodotus of the robbery of Rhampsinitus' trea- 
sury, shows to what extent the system of secret passages was carried, and 
the ingenuity with which they were made and concealed. 

The velocity with which water flows from an ordinary siphon necessarily 
diminishes as the surface in the reservoir falls. In some cases a uniform 
discharge is desirable. No. 239 shows how ancient engineers accomplished 
this. A float or hollow dish was attached to the end of the short leg, so 
that the instrument descended with the water. The long leg was passed 
loosely through two openings in projecting pieces that preserved it in the 
proper position. 

The difference in the specific gravity of liquids was a fruitful source 
of deception. Many capital tricks were based upon it, especially when 
the lighter fluids employed were of the same color as those on which they 
reposed. If for example, a vessel contained oil, wine and water, these 
liquids could be discharged by a siphon like No. 239 in the same order; 
and by secretly raising or lowering an ordinary one, or the moveable tube 
in No. 238, any one liquid could be drawn off. Fresh water being lighter 
than salt is often found some distance at sea ; and sailors, like old jugglers, 
can draw up either, according to the depth to which their buckets are 
immersed. Four miles from the mouth of the Mississippi the fresh water 
is about two feet deep, and at ten miles it may be obtained by careful 
dipping. 

In problem XXX of the Spiritalia, Heron shows how siphons may be 
concealed within the figures of oxen or other animals in the act of drink- 
ing ; the orifice of the short leg being at the mouth, and that of the long 
one in one of the feet. See No. 240. When the bore of the siphon is 
properly adjusted to the quantity of water flowing into a basin, the animal 
will appear to drink the whole. 



520 



Tantalus' Cups — Magic Pitchers. 



[Book V. 



The following represent a number of Tantalus' cups, magic goblets, &c. 
In No. 241, the long leg of the siphon passes through the bottom of the 
vessel, and the short one remains above ; so that when the liquid rises 
over the bend, it will be discharged by the siphon into the cavity below. 




No. 241. 



No. 242. 



No. 243. 



No. 244. 



No. 245 



Devices of this kind admit of numerous modifications by which the tube 
may be concealed. When it is enclosed within the figure of a man, (the 
water entering at one foot slightly raised, and passing out through the 
other,) the vessel is named a Tantalus' cup, and the liquid instead of enter- 
ing the mouth, as in No. 240, only rises to the chin, and then runs away — 
illustrating the classical fable, which represents Tantalus suffering the 
tortures of thirst in the midst of water that reached to his lips, but which 
on his attempting to taste sunk below his reach ; hence the origin of our 
word tantalize, and its relatives. 

Next, sufFring grievous torments, I beheld 

Tantalus : in a pool he stood, his chin 

Wash'd by the wave ; thirst parch'd he seem'd, but found 

Nought to assuage his thirst ; for when he bow'd 

His hoary head, ardent to quaff, the flood 

Vanish'd absorb'd, and at his feet, adust 

The soil appear'd, dried instant, by the gods. 

Odys. xi. Cowper. 

It is supposed the fable was intended to illustrate the influence of ava- 
rice, by which misers in the midst of plenty often deny themselves the 
necessaries and comforts of life. 

Sometimes the sides and bottom of Tantalus' cups are made hollow and 
the siphon formed within them. No. 242 is one of these. An examina- 
tion of it will sufficiently explain the construction. A small opening near 
the bottom (which may easily be concealed) communicates with a passage 
formed by a partition, above the top of which the liquid must rise before 
it can pass down the other side into the base of the cup. 

In No. 243 the siphon is formed within the handle. The short leg 
communicates with the lower part of the cup at the swell, so as not easily 
to be detected, and the long one with the cavity formed below. The 
figure represents a Tantalus' cup in our possession. 

A liquid is retained in one of these as in an ordinary goblet, so long as 
the surface does not reach above the highest part of the siphon ; but if 
the cup be once inclined so as to set the latter in operation, the contents 
will gradually be transferred to the hollow base, and this whether the 
vessel be replaced in an upright position or not. Thus tankards have 



Chap. 6.] Goblet for unwelcome Guests. 521 

been so contrived that the act of applying them to the lips charged the 
siphon, and the liquid instead of entering the mouth then passed through 
an illegal passage into the cavity formed for its reception below. By 
making the capacity of the siphon sufficiently large, a person ignorant of 
the device would find it a difficult matter even to taste the contents how- 
ever thirsty he might be. In the dark ages, simple people would naturally 
on such occasions give credit to legends respecting mischievous demons 
loving beer and taking these opportunities to get it. Dishonest publicans 
whose sign-boards announced " entertainment for man and beast," are 
said to have occasionally thus despoiled travelers of a portion of their ale 
or mead, as well as their horses of feed. Oats were put into a perforated 
manger, and a large part forced through the openings into a receptable 
below, by the movements of the hungry animal's mouth. 

Martial the Roman poet refers to tricks of ancient publicans, and what 
will surprise some readers, he complains of having had wine foisted on 
him instead of water. Ravenna was originally built like Venice on piles, 
and was a sea-port, though now several miles inland. "Water has always 
been extremely scarce at this city, and probably was more so formerly 
than at present. In the poet's time it seems to have brought a higher 
price than inferior kinds of wine. Hence his complaint : 

By a Ravenna vintner once betray'd, 

So much for wine and water mix'd I paid ; 

But when I thought the purchas'd liquor mine, 

The rascal fobb'd rne off with wine. L. iii, Ep. 57. Addison. 

No. 244, a magical pitcher, from the eighth problem of the Spiritalia. 
The siphon is not employed, but the device is allied to the preceding 
ones. A horizontal partition or diaphragm perforated with minute holes 
divides the vessel into two parts. The handle is hollow and air-tight, 
and at the place where its lower end is connected to the pitcher, a tube 
proceeds from it and reaches nearly to the bottom. At the upper part of 
the handle a small hole is drilled, where the thumb or finger can readily 
cover it. It should be disguised by some neighboring ornament or scroll. 
If this pitcher be half filled with water and inverted, the liquid would be 
retained as long as the small hole in the handle was closed — being sus- 
pended as in the atmospheric sprinkling pot, No. 69 and 70, and in Tutia's 
sieve, No. 74. If the lower part be filled with water and the upper with 
wine, the liquids will not mix as long as the small hole in the handle is 
closed ; the wine can then either be drunk or poured out. If the hole be 
left some time open, a mixture of both liquors will be discharged. With 
a vessel of this kind, says an old writer, " You may welcome unbidden 
guests. Having the lower part already filled with water, call to your ser- 
vant to fill your pot with wine ; then you may drink unto your guest, 
drinking up all the wine : when he takes the pitcher thinking to pledge 
you in the same, and finding the contrary, will happily stay away until 
he be invited, fearing that his next presumption might more sharply be 
rewarded." 

Another old way of getting rid of an unwelcome visiter, was by offering 
him wine in a cup resembling No. 245. The sides were double, and an 
air-tight cavity formed between them. When the vessel was filled, some 
of the liquid entered the cavity and compressed the air within ; so that 
when the cup was inclined to the lips and partly emptied, the pressure 
being diminished, the air expanded, and drove part of the contents in the 
face of the drinker. Porta, in his Natural Magic, (Eng. translation. 1658,) 
mentions several similar devices, but they are all to be found in one form 

66 



522 



Siphons, A. £>. 1511. 



[BookV. 



or another in the Spiritalia. One goblet was so contrived that " no man 
can drink out of it but he who knows the art." The liquid was suspended 
in cavities and discharged by admitting or excluding air through secret 
openings. Another one " for making sport with them that sit at table with 
us," a cup into which wine was poured in the presence of the drinker, but 
who could derive from it nothing but water, &c. 

The necromancers of the Tartars and Cathayans, [Chinese,] says 
Purchas, " are exceedingly expert in their divellish art. They cause that 
the bottles in the hall of the great khan doe fill the bowls [cups] of their own 
accord, which also without man's help pass ten paces through the ayre into 
the hands of the great khan ; and when he hath drunke, in like sort they 
returne to their place." The cups were doubtless filled and moved by 
some ingenious device ; but this being concealed, the whole was of course 
miraculous. 

Among the antiquities of Lunenburg was a magical goblet or ewer, 
** une aiguiere dans laquelle il y a un secret hydraulique." (Le Curieux 
Antiquaire, a Leide, 1729, torn ii, 495.) 

From the time of Heron up to the 16th and 17th centuries little specific 
information respecting siphons is to be met with. They were of course 
known to the Romans. Sir Wm. Gell supposes some modification of them 
was employed in connecting the large boilers in which water was heated 
for the public baths. It appears from discoveries made in Pompeii that 
these vessels were closed on all sides and bore some resemblance to the 
bodies of modern stills ; and that to economize the heat, three of them 
were placed upon each other. The lowest one in contact with the fire 
was the largest, and named " the caldarium, that above it the tepidarium, 
and the uppermost which was supplied with cold water directly from the 
aqueduct or other reservoir the frigidarium ; and they were so contrived, 
by means of something of the nature of a siphon, that when the water of 
the lowest was drawn off for the bath, an equal quantity descended simul- 
taneously from the second to the lowest cauldron, and from the uppermost 
to the second." Julius Pollux, who lived in the second century, informs 
us that siphons were used for tasting wine. They are also referred to by 
other ancient writers, but as several instruments were designated by the 
same name, it is difficult to determine with precision what particular one 
was, in every case, intended. It is very probable, from the remark of 
Pollux, which is corroborated by the illustration No. 235, that siphons 
were employed by ancient vintners and private gentlemen for decanting 
wine, just as the same classes use them at this day. 




No. 246. A. D. 151 1. No. 247. A. D. 1511. 

The earliest modern figures of siphons that we have met with are in the 
German translation of Vegetius, ErfFurt, 1511. The above figures, Nos. 



Chap. 6.] 



Modern Siphons. 



523 



246 and 247 are copies. Both are designed to show the application of 
these instruments for transferring large quantities of water over rising 
grounds, as mentioned by Heron. No. 246 is formed entirely of wooden 
planks strongly nailed together. The upper ends of the two trunks or 
pipes are united to a square and close box, by means of which they were 
charged through the opening on the top. The lower orifices were tem- 
porarily closed by plugs, figured below with short ropes attached. When 
the whole was filled, the hole at the top was closed by driving in the stop- 
per, figured near it, and then the two plugs below were withdrawn by 
means of the ropes. 

There is little doubt that large siphons made of planks and jointed or 
lined with pitch would work well, even if they were not perfectly tight, 
provided the orifice of the discharging leg was considerably lower than 
the surface of the water in which the short leg was placed. 

Heron directed large siphons to be filled through a funnel at the top, 
and the orifices closed below, as represented in Nos. 246 and 247. 

No. 247 was of metal, but charged like the last by means of a wooden 
box ; the opening to admit the water and its stopper being clearly repre- 
sented. There appears no device for closing the lower ends of this 
siphon ; and as they enter the water perpendicularly, the plugs and ropes 
used in No. 246 would hardly apply. Probably the short leg was closed 
by a valve opening upwards at the bottom of the box, on which account 
the latter was made conical to afford room for it to play. This valve 
would be sufficient for the purpose of charging the siphon, provided the 
upper part of the box was higher than any other part of the instrument. 
We therefore suppose that the disproportionate size of the box and its 
being figured below the bend are errors of the artist. 

Of modern improvements, the addition of sucking tubes by which small 
siphons are now commonly charged was the first. It is uncertain when 
or by whom they were introduced. They do not appear to have been 
much used, if at all, before the early part of the last century ; for all the 
siphons described in old treatises on chemistry, distilling, &c. invariably 
consist of single tubes, which were either charged by immersing them, or 
by drawing out the air from the orifice of the discharging leg by the 
mouth. It may contribute to some future history of the siphon to preserve 
a few of these. 




Nos. 248. 



The first two are from the English translation of one of Conrad Gesner's 
works, Lond. 1599. (See page 381 of this volume.) Speaking of draw- 
ing off water from the head of a still, the author observes, " You may put 
certaine draying pipes into the cover such as you see here livelie portray- 
ed." Copies of the same are inserted in several other old works. In 
* Maison Rustique," Paris, 1574, folio 217, they are to be seen, and the 
instruments are said to have been made of tin plate* (tuyaux defer blanc.) 

a This beautiful manufacture (tin plate) which contributes so largely to the furnishing 
of our kitchens, &c. is supposed to be of ancient date. The Germans were the first 
makers of it in modern times. 



524 Sucking Tube — Valve- Siphon. [Book V 

No. 250 is from the " Dictionnaire CEconomique," Paris, 1732, 3d edit. 
Tome i, 864. It is obviously copied, with the distilling apparatus of which 
it forms a part, from some older work. No. 248 differs in nothing from 
those belonging one of the Pharaohs, (No. 236,) while the forms of Nos. 
249 and 250 are evidently owing to the material of which they are made, 
viz. tinned iron ; the legs were separate pieces, and their junction formed 
an acute angle. 

The sucking tube is not figured by Decaus, Fludd, Moxon, Boyle, Beli- 
dor ; nor yet by Rohault, Gravesande, Desaguliers, and the Abbe Nollet, 
although it was in use before the popular works of the last named authors 
were published. Switzer, in his Hydrostatics, 1729, has figured a siphon 
for transferring water over a hill with a short sucking tube attached ; but 
this is placed near the top, and was designed to draw off the air that 
might accumulate at the bend after the instrument had been some time 
in use. 

In Martin's " Philosophical Grammar," Lond. 1762, sixth edit. No. 251 
is represented. The sucking tube appears but as the nucleus of the 
modern one, being a very short conical piece attached to the extremity 
of the discharging leg. The figure we suppose was in the previous edi- 
tions of the work. It was copied into the London Magazine for 1764, 
p. 584, and is there named " the syphon or crane in common use" But 
the sucking tube was fully developed before these dates. In " Arts et 
Metieres," it is not curtailed of its fair proportions. The treatise on the Art 
of the Cooper, (Art du Tonnelier,) was published in 1763, and in it No. 
252 is given as the siphon then used in Paris for emptying wine casks, &c. 
It was made of tin plate, and for the convenience of hanging it up when 
not in use, a ring was attached to the upper part. " Ce siphon est connu 
sous le nom de pompe." (Folio edit. p. 47.) 

" L'Art du Distillateur Liquoriste," was published in 1775. In it 
another valuable modification of the siphon is exhibited. See No. 253. 
This in its outline resembles the preceding one, being made of the same 
material. It has no sucking tube, but the discharging leg is closed by a 
cock, and the receiving one by a light valve opening inw T ards ; hence 
when once charged, this siphon would always remain so while the cock 
was kept shut : it could be moved from one vessel to empty another at 
pleasure, for as soon as the end of the short leg was immersed and the 
cock opened, it would commence to act. This instrument was named 
" siphon a clapet." (Folio edit. p. 140.) 

The more common form of the siphon as now used is shown at No. 254, 
a valve in the short leg being dispensed with. Small instruments are 
so easily charged, that little or no advantage is derived from keeping them 
filled. Liquids confined in them become insipid, and in some cases tainted 
by the material of the tube ; besides, as small siphons are required to 
decant different liquids, their contents must be discharged every time the 
liquid is changed. On these accounts the valve has been dropped. The 
junction of the sucking tube with the discharging leg must always be kept 
below the surface of the fluid to be drawn, as the virtual length of the leg 
there terminates. By means of the cock the discharge can always be 
regulated, and when a receiving vessel is filled — entirely stopped until 
another vessel is prepared. 

Siphons with small syringes attached for the purpose of charging them, 
are frequently made by silversmiths for decanting wine from ordinary 
bottles, &c. See No. 255. The capacity of the syringe should equal 
that of the siphon, as one stroke only (an upward one) of the piston can 
be used. Atmospheric and forcing pumps are often used to charge very 



Chip. 6.] 



Wirtemburg and Argand's Siphon. 



525 



long siphons ; the former being applied to the discharging, and the latter 
to the receiving orifice. 

Of devices for stopping and renewing the discharge without either cocks 
or valves, the Wirtemburg siphon is the oldest. It was so named from 
its invention in that city. The legs are of equal length, and to prevent 
the admission of air when the instrument is not in use, their ends are bent 
upwards. See No. 256. (For the convenience of discharge, one end is 
commonly recurved.) The alledged advantages of this siphon over others 
were more imaginary than real. It was at one time announced as " a very 
extraordinary machine, performing divers things which the common siphon 
cannot reach." Thus, when the legs were inserted in different vessels, it 
was said to preserve the liquid at the same level in both ; and although 
the legs were of equal length, water rose indifferently up one and descend- 
ed through the other, besides other properties which in fact are common 
to all siphons. Its only peculiarity consists in the ends of the legs being 
turned upwards, so as to retain the fluid within, and thus be always ready 
for use : but this retention of the contents, although theoretically true, is 
in practice hardly attainable, since it requires the orifices to be always 
preserved on the same horizontal line — a condition extremely difficult to 
perform, except with very small instruments, and whose ends are turned 
considerably up. If the ends reach only to a level with the upper side of 
the flexure, the slightest change of position makes one leg longer than the 
other ; air is admitted, and in a moment the whole contents are expelled. 
A siphon thus made of inch, or f inch tubing, could not be moved from 
one vessel to another, or hung against a wall, without the contents being 
displaced. Disks or stoppers placed over the orifices would prevent this, 
but they would virtually be valves. The Wirtemburg siphon is conse- 
quently seldom seen except in the lecture room. (See Phil. Trans, xv, 
846-7, and Lowthorp's Abridg. i, 537-9.) 

In 1808, M. Argand, the inventor of lamp burners that go under his 

name, devised a " valve siphon" precisely 
similar to No. 253. From remarks made 
in the journals of the time, he seems to have 
been considered the introducer of the valve 
— an erroneous idea. As regards the con- 
struction of his siphon all that could be claim- 
ISffitif£ ; by or for him was the mode of connecting 
g^_^gj pf the legs to the horizontal part by screws, so 
that they might easily be separated, either 
for the purpose of cleaning or more con- 
veniently packing. But Argand's mode of 
charging his siphon was novel. It was 
effected on the same principle as water is 
raised by the canne hydraulique, (page 372,) viz. by moving the instru- 
ment perpendicularly up and down in the liquid, until it became filled. 
Instead of imparting motion to the whole instrument, which in larger ones 
would be inconvenient, M. Hachette suggests that the lower part of the 
receiving leg be connected to the upper part by a flexible tube of leather 
or cloth impermeable to liquids, so that the part in which the valve is 
situated need only be moved. See No. 257. 

Siphons are necessary in numerous manipulations of the laboratory, and 
modern researches in chemistry have given rise to several beautiful devices 
for charging them, and also for interrupting and renewing their action. 
When corrosive liquids or those of high temperatures are to be transferred 
by siphons, it is often inconvenient, and sometimes dangerous to put them 




No. 256. 



No. 25: 



52G 



Siphons used by Chemists. 



[Book V. 



in op< ration by the lungs. Moreover cocks and valves jf metal are acted 
on by acids, and in some cases would affect or destroy the properties of 



• he {- ids themselves. 




No. 258 



No. 259. 



No. 260. 



No. 261. No. 262. 



No. 263. 



No. 258 shows how hot or corrosive liquids may be drawn off from a 
wide mouthed bottle or jar. The short leg of a siphon is inserted through 
the cork ; and also a small tube, through which the operator blows, and 
by the pressure of his breath forces the liquid through the siphon. 

No. 259 represents a siphon sometimes employed by chemists. When 
used, the short leg is first placed in the fluid to be decanted, the flame of 
a lamp or candle is then applied to the underside of the bulb ; the heat 
rarefies the air, and consequently drives out the greater part of it through 
the discharging orifice. The finger is applied to this orifice, and as the bulb 
becomes cool the atmosphere drives up the liquid into the void and puts 
the instrument in operation. 

No. 260 is a siphon by M. Collardeau. It is charged by pouring a 
quantity of the fluid to be decanted into the funnel ; the bent pipe attached 
to which terminates near the top of the discharging leg. The fluid in 
descending through this leg bears down the air within it, on the principle 
of the trombe, and the atmosphere drives up the liquid in the reservoir 
through the short leg. In experiments with this instrument we invariably 
found the contents of the charging tube drawn into the siphon whenever 
the orifice of the discharging leg was not made smaller than the bore of 
the receiving one. By not attending to this, such siphons will only act as 
long as water is poured into the funnel. 

No. 261. A glass siphon for decanting acids, &c. It is charged by 
sucking, and to guard against the contents entering the mouth, a bulb is 
blown on the sucking tube. The accumulation of a liquid in this bulb 
being visible, the operator can always withdraw his lips in time to pre- 
vent his tasting it. 

No. 262 is designed to retain its contents when not in use, so that on 
plunging the short leg deep into a liquid the instrument will operate. This 
effect however will not follow if the end of the discharging leg descend 
below the flexure near it, and if its orifice be not contracted nearly to that 
of a capillary tube. 

No. 263 is a siphon by which liquids may be drawn at intervals, viz. 
by raising and lowering the end of the discharging leg according to the 
surface of the liquid in the cistern. 

Our own labors have developed some novel modifications of the siphon. 
No. 264 is charged by an apparatus designed as a substitute for the 
syringe. (See No. 255.) The sucking tube of an ordinary siphon is made 
to pass through the centre of a much larger pipe. This is closed at the 
bottom, open at top, and its length equal to that of the short leg. A move- 
able tube open at bottom and closed above is fitted to slide in the last, and 
is of such a bore that the space between its sides and the exhausting tube 



Chap. 6. 



Ewhank's Siphons. 



527 



equals the capacity, of the siphon. To use this instrument, fill the wide 
tube with water or some other fluid, and place the short leg into the liquid 
to be decanted ; then close the orifice of the long leg with the finger, and 
raise the moveable tube (by the ring attached to it) and the siphon will 
be 1 charged. In using this instrument, the fluid by which it is charged 
does not mix with that which is decanted, as in No. 260. The apparatus 
is more simple than a syringe and is not liable to be deranged. By using 
mercury both the length and bore of the charging tubes may be greatly 
reduced. As these tubes themselves constitute a siphon, (see No. 238,) 
the upper end of the small exhausting one should extend a little above 
that which contains the charging fluid, lest this should occasionally rise 
over the orifice — in which case the whole would be drawn off. A descrip- 
tion of this siphon was published in the Journal of the Franklin Institute 
for November, 1834. 





No. 264. No. 265, No. 266. No. 267. 



No. 268. 



No. 269. 



Nos. 265-6 represent another mode of charging siphons on the same 
principle, but the apparatus is more simple and is accompanied with some 
peculiar advantages. The siphon itself has no exhausting pipe attached 
to it, but is a bent tube simply. It is put in operation by means of a 
moveable tube of about the same length as the discharging leg, and having 
the bottom closed and a lip or spout formed on its upper edge. This 
tubular vessel is filled with water (or other fluid) and the long leg of the 
siphon inserted into it. The short leg is then placed into the liquid to be 
decanted and the moveable tube drawn gently down. The air within 
becomes rarefied and the instrument charged in consequence of the vacuity 
left in the long leg by the receding liquid. The moveable tube may then 
be wholly withdrawn or not as circumstances may dictate. If the liquid 
is to be decanted at intervals, or the stream increased or diminished, the 
tube should be used ; thus, to lessen or stop the discharge, slide up the 
tube and as the lip approaches to a level with the surface in the reservoir 
the stream will become less and less, and by raising it still higher, as in 
No. 265, entirely stopped. Hence the instrument acts as a perfect cock, 
by which the liquid may be discharged in single drops or in a full stream, 
and unlike the ordinary brass taps, it can never leak nor require repairs. 

The apparatus also performs the part of a guage, viz. by accurately indi- 
cating the surface of the fluid within any vessel to which it is attached. 
Suppose we wish to know the quantity of liquid remaining in a demijohn, 
or other close vessel, after drawing off part by one of these siphons; all 
that is required is to slide up the tube till the liquid barely drops from the 
lip — its surface in the tube will then be on the same level as in the demi- 
john. If the moveable tube be made of glass, the quantity left can always 
be known at sight, because its surface in the tube would always be visible. 
A device of this kind might be employed to draw off and to guage the 



528 Ewbank's Siphons. [Book V. 

contents of standing casks. It would be better to make the discharging 
leg of this siphon of rather larger bore than the short one, since the rare- 
faction would then be more perfect. The discharging leg must always 
be inserted in the moveable tube before the short one is placed in the 
liquid to be transferred. (See Journal of the Franklin Institute for July 
and November, 1834.) 

No. 267 is formed of a conical tube, and charged by the act of placing 
it in the fluid to be transferred. The end of the long leg is first closed 
tight by the finger, and the short one then immersed as deep as can be 
conveniently in the liquid. The air being thus confined prevents the liquid 
from entering, but when the finger is withdrawn, it is urged up the short 
leg by the hydrostatic pressure of the column over the orifice of the latter, 
and the momentum of the large volume contained in the lower part drives 
sufficient over the bend to put the instrument in operation. The action 
of this siphon depends upon the same principle as the spouting tubes 
described in the last chapter. This siphon is in fact merely one of these 
bent into a proper form. The bend should be a regular curve in order to 
present as little obstruction as possible to the liquid in passing over : it 
should also be short, so as to require less of the passing fluid to fill it than 
a longer one. The proportions of the different parts of these siphons 
should approach those represented in the cut. Small siphons on this plan 
are limited in their application to those cases where the short legs can be 
immersed half their depth or more; but the application of large instruments 
increases with the depth. (See No. 226 and remarks upon it, page 499.) 

Nos. 268-9 are blowing siphons, being charged by blowing with the 
mouth through the tubes connected to the orifices of the discharging legs. 
This mode of producing a vacuum in one pipe by blowing air through 
another is sufficiently explained in a previous chapter. In No. 269, the 
junction of the siphon with the blowing tube is flush or smooth in the 
interior of the latter, and whenever this is the case a conical ajutage must 
be added as represented, or the instrument cannot be charged. (See 
remarks on blowing tubes, pp. 486-7.) The better way is to make the 
siphon like No. 268, in which a part of the leg projects into the blowing 
tube and diverts the current of air from the lungs over the orifice, as in 
Nos. 205-'6, '7, and '13. These are more readily charged than the others, 
and although they will operate without the conical ajutage, they are much 
easier charged with it. By such siphons water may be raised one or two 
feet by a smart puff. They are safe and convenient to transfer acids, &c. 
as there is not the least danger of receiving any portion into the mouth, 
as when sucking siphons are used. 

Siphons are now used, as they were by the Egyptians in Heron's time, 
to convey water to considerable distances. When they are laid over 
ground that is elevated from 20 to 25 feet above the spring, a quantity of 
air is disengaged from the water at the highest parts of the tube, and accu- 
mulating there is very apt to cause the action to cease. To prevent this, 
a close vessel, furnished with a cock and funnel at the top, should be con- 
nected at its bottom to the highest part of the siphon by a stop cock or 
valve. The air evolved from the water will collect in this vessel and 
should be occasionally drawn off in the following manner. Shut the lower 
cock and open the one attached to the funnel ; then expel the air by filling 
the vessel with water and turn the cocks as at first. As fresh portions of 
air arise from the liquid, they will enter the vessel and drive the water 
down the discharging leg. When the ground is very uneven at the 
highest parts, the several eminences of the siphon should be connected by 
small tubes to the air-chamber. 



Chap. 6.] Water conveyed over rising grounds by Siphons. 529 

We have known siphons from a quarter to half a mile in length, and 
formed of leaden pipes only half an inch in the bore continue running from 
nine to fifteen months without once stopping, although no air-vessels were 
attached to them. In one case the pipe was 1200 feet in length, the orifice 
of the discharging leg was but five or six feet below that of the receiving 
one, and the highest part of the tube was from 12 to 15 feet above the 
surface of the spring. 

An opinion is current with some writers, that the extreme elevation to 
which water can be carried by siphons was unknown to the ancients, and 
that Heron, the most celebrated writer of antiquity upon these instru- 
ments, was not himself aware of its limitation to about 30 feet. It is not 
clear that Heron was thus ignorant ; but if he were, it would only show 
that in this department of the arts he was no practical man. That ancient 
plumbers and pump-makers, who prepared and laid large siphons were 
aware of the limitation there can be no doubt, just as the same class of 
mechanics were in modern times with regard to pumps, before philosophers 
were informed of the fact or able to account for it. As however siphons 
for conveying water over hills and to great distances have always been 
of rare occurrence, (comparatively speaking,) it is not at all surprising that 
even some hydraulic engineers should have been thus ignorant with regard 
to them, although familiar with the extent to which water can be raised by 
atmospheric pumps. If some of these men have talked of conveying 
water by siphons over mountains, we never hear them speak of raising it 
to equal elevations through the suction pipes of pumps. Daily experience 
in applying the latter to various depths prevented them from falling into 
the error. 

Baptist Porta, in the 19th Book of his Natural Magic, speaks of raising 
water by a siphon to the top of a high tower, and several old writers have 
the same conceit. This was in accordance with the ancient doctrine of the 
plenists, who denied the possibility of a vacuum. They attributed the ascent 
of liquids through siphons to nature's abhorrence of a void, and imagined 
the elevation to be unlimited. But these men were philosophers, whose 
practical knowledge was confined to portable experiments ; had they been 
working pump-makers they would have known better ; they would have 
become advocates for the opposite doctrine — vacuists. So long was the 
error of the plenists maintained, observes Switzer, " that I have seen a 
book of Machines, written even in Queen Elizabeth's time, by one Ward, 
an engineer, who ventur'd to give a sketch of a high hill, and a house at the 
bottom or side, over which, by a vast extended syphon, the water was to 
be convey'd from one vale to another." The author of the old treatise, 
entitled, ' Art and Nature,' quoted at pp. 321, 375, was of the same opi- 
nion. " How to convey water over a mountain : this experiment is as easie 
to be performed as any of the former, and indeed after the same manner, 
for you must lay a pipe of lead over the mountain, with one end in the 
spring or water that you desire to convey, and the other end must lie 
somewhat lower ; then open the pipe at the top of the mountain ; stop 
both ends of the pipe, and with a tunnell fill the pipe full of water ; then 
close it up exactly that neither ayer nor water may come out thereat ; then 
unstop both the ends of the pipe, and the water will run continually," 
(p. 10.) Decaus appears to have been better informed, if we may judge 
from his remarks respecting the perpendicular length of pipes of atmo- 
spheric pumps. In large engines, he recommends that they be not made 
over 20 feet ; and including the working cylinders, he says, •' I am of 
opinion that it [the water] must not be constrained to rise more than thirty 
feet in height." The second plate of his " Forcible Movements" repre- 

67 



530 Discharging Water above its Source by Siphons. [Book V, 

sents two atmospheric pumps placed one above the other, and the lowest 
one raised it from "24 to 30 feet," and the upper one " may raise it from 
thence 24 or 30 feet" higher. The " Forcible Movements," it will be 
remembered, was published about thirty years before the discovery of 
atmospheric pressure. 

Contrivances for discharging water from the highest part of siphons 
have often been proposed. They are to be met with in several old authors, 
and the principle of most of them may be found in the Spiritalia. They 
are however seldom employed, because circumstances on which they de- 
pend rarely occur ; and other devices are preferable even under those 
circumstances. A descriptive account of a few of them may interest some 
machinists, and be serviceable to others, viz : by preventing them from 
expending their energies in devising similar things. Indeed in this respect 
books which contain accounts only of the best machines are not always the 
most useful to inventors. In whatever department of the arts these men 
exercise their talents they are almost certain to fall at one time or another 
on old devices, which appear to them both new and equal to similar plans 
in Common use. Books therefore which describe rejected and antiquated 
contrivances are not so worthless as some persons imagine. 

One plan to raise water by a siphon consists in enlarging or swelling it 
out at or near the bend, or what amounts to the same thing, connecting 
the legs to an air-tight vessel ; and when this becomes filled the commu- 
nication between it and the legs is cut off by valves or cocks, and the 
contents drawn off. When this is done the vessel remains filled with air, 
which if admitted into the legs would stop the action of the siphon. It 
must therefore, in order to expel the air, be filled with some liquid to 
replace that drawn out. Suppose a siphon of this kind be designed to 
raise water for the supply of a dwelling, in or near which the vessel is 
placed, it may then be refilled with refuse or impure water, which on 
adjusting the cocks will pass down the discharging leg. Then after a 
short time elapses, the vessel will again be filled with fresh water, which 
may be again exchanged for the same quantity of impure. 

In locations where river, salt, or any other water can thus be exchanged 
for fresh, and it is desirable to do so, such devices are applicable. (In 
breweries, distilleries, &c. the descent of one liquid may thus be made to 
raise another.) It should however be observed that an equal quantity must 
be given for that received, and it must descend rather more than the latter 
rises. But when circumstances allow these conditions to be fulfilled, the 
apparatus is not always to be depended upon ; air insinuates itself through 
the minutest imperfections in the pipes and cocks, and often deranges the 
whole. One of these siphons is described in Nicholson's Journal, 4to. 
vol. iv, and in vol. ii, of Gregory's Mechanics. Another in the Biblio- 
theque Phisico-Economique, which is copied in vol. x, of the Repertory 
of Arts, 2d series. Another is figured in Art and Nature, A. D. 1633, 
with two close reservoirs at the top ; and Porta, in cap. 3, book xix, of his 
Magic, describes another, with the close vessel on the top of a tower : the 
discharging leg is described as terminating in another close vessel of the 
same size as the one above, and furnished with a cock and funnel through 
which to fill it, and another cock to discharge the contents : this charg- 
ing vessel from his description appears to have been placed on the ground 
a little below the spring and then emptied — if so, the apparatus could not 
act. He does not appear to have been aware of the necessity of the con- 
tents of the lower vessel being discharged from the orifice of a pipe as 
much below as the receiving vessel on the tower was above the spring. 
The device (which he probably imperfectly copied from some older author) 



Chap. 6.] 



Ram Siphon. 



531 



would then be tne same as the siphon for raising water which Gravesande 
has figured in the seeond volume of his Philosophy, p. 39, plate 74. 

The best of these devices are not only subject to derangement by the 
wear of the cocks and valves, and want of care in opening and closing them 
at the proper times, but they require almost as much attendance as would 
suffice to raise the water directly from the spring. On this account various 
contrivances have been proposed to render them self-acting. 

An ingenious device of this kind may be seen in the Gentleman's Ma- 
gazine for 1747, p. 582. It is named a " lifting siphon" Water from a 
spring is received into an open cistern, from the bottom of which a pipe 
descends to a perpendicular depth of 33 feet. The bore of this pipe is 
closed and opened by two stop-cocks, one at its lower end and the other 
near the upper, or just below its junction with the cistern. A close 
vessel to receive the water raised is to be fixed at any required elevation, 
not exceeding 30 feet above the cistern ; and from its bottom a pipe 
descends to within two inches of the bottom of the cistern. This pipe 
constitutes the short leg of the siphon, and its upper orifice is covered by 
a valve to prevent the water that ascends through it from returning. From 
the top of the close vessel a small or exhausting pipe proceeds down to 
the one beneath the cistern and is connected to it below the upper cock. 
Thus united they may be considered as the long ]eg of the siphon, al- 
though water only descends through the lower branch and air through the 
upper one. The apparatus for alternately opening and closing the cocks 
(upon which the action of the machine depends) is somewhat similar in 
principle to that represented at page 354. A bucket containing water is 
the prime mover ; a rope attached to it is passed twice round two rollers, 
and a counterpoise is suspended from the other end of the rope. When 
the bucket is partly filled it preponderates, and when it is emptied the 
counterpoise prevails ; hence an alternating movement is imparted to the 
rollers and to the plugs of the two cocks, as the shanks of these constitute 
the axles of the rollers. 

A plan for making siphons of this description self-acting by means of 
four vessels placed one over the other, and each provided with a siphon 
by which its contents may be discharged, was proposed by Mr. Wm. 
Close, in Nicholson's Journal before referred to. 

M. Hachette has combined the ram 
of Montgolfier with the siphon, in order 
to discharge water from the apex of the 
latter : see the annexed figure. A the 
short leg and R the long or discharg- 
ing one. The upper end of each termi- 
nates in a close chamber within which 
two valves attached to a perpendicular 
rod are made to work. The upper 
valve closes an opening in the horizon- 
tal partition that separates the interior 
of the chamber from the air-vessel and 
jet pipe above. The seat of the lower 
valve is at the orifice of It. The dis- 
tance between the valves is such that 
when one is closed the other is open. 
Their movements are produced as in 
the ram ; a coiled spring keeps the 
upper one closed till the momentum of 
the fluid in passing through the siphon 




No. 270. Ram siphon. 



532 Fountains and Jets d'eau. [Book V. 

shuts the lower one. The lower end of R is furnished with a cock, and 
that of A with a valve opening outwards, for the purpose of charging the 
siphon through an opening at B. When in operation, the water after 
running a little while acquires sufficient momentum to shut the lower valve, 
upon which a portion rushes into the air-vessel and escapes in a jet ; the 
spring then closes the upper valve, and the fluid descends through R till 
the lower valve is again closed and another jet produced. 



CHAPTER VII. 

Fountains: Variety of their forms, ornaments and accompaniments — Landscape gardeners— Curious 
fountains from Decaus — Fountains in old Rome — Water issuing from statues — Fountains in Pompeii — 
Automaton trumpeter— Fountains by John of Bologna and M. Angelo — Old fountains in Nuremberg, 
Augsburg and Brussels — Shakespeare, Drayton and Spencer quoted— Fountains of Alcinous — The 
younger Pliny's account of fountains in the gardens of his Tuscan villa— Eating in gardens — Alluded 
to in Solomon's Song — Cato the Censor — Singular fountains in Italy— Fountains described by Marco 
Paulo and other old writers — Predilection for artificial trees in fountains — Perfumed and musical foun- 
tains — Fountains within public and private buildings — Enormous cost of perfumed waters at Romau 
feasts — Lucan quoted— Introduction of fountains into modern theatres and churches recommended- 
Fountains in the apartments of Eastern princes — Water conveyed through pipes by the ancients into 
fields for the use of their cattle — Three and four-way cocks. 

Artificial fountains and jets d'eau are of extreme antiquity : although 
they were not (like natural ones) objects of worship among the ancients, 
they were at least held in great estimation, and unusual care was often 
taken in designing and decorating them. Indeed no other hydraulic 
devices have ever been so greatly and so variously enriched with ornament. 
The pipes of supply were concealed in columns, &c. and their orifices 
wrought into numerous emblematic figures, (see page 119,) while the 
basins that received the fluid were generally of polished marble. Some- 
times the pipes terminated in statues of men, women, children, animals, 
birds, fishes, vases, gods, goddesses, &c. From them the fluid spouted 
high in the air, or was discharged directly into receivers, or broken in its 
descent by intervening objects : oftentimes it was made to flow over the 
rim of a vase, to issue from others that seemed to have been accidentally 
overturned, and not infrequently the figure of a female poured it from a 
pitcher. 

From the facility of applying water as a motive agent another feature 
was added. Various automata were put in motion by mechanism con 
cealed in the base or pedestal from which the fluid issued — figures of 
men blew trumpets and played on organs, and automaton birds warbled 
forth notes on adjacent trees. (Such devices are described by Heron.) 
All the senses were often gratified at these fountains ; the sultry atmo- 
sphere was cooled and rendered grateful to the feeling — the sparkling 
liquid quenched the thirst— sight was gratified in contemplating the design 
and execution of the whole, and noticing the ever-changing forms assumed 
by the moving fluid — the pleasure derived from the sound of falling water 
has ever been noticed by poets — and not to forget the sense of smelling, 
in those fountains that were designed only to moderate the temperature of 
the air, the water was often perfumed. 



Chap. 7.] Fountains in Decaus — others in Rome. 533 

The taste of old landscape gardeners for fountains and cascades, ser- 
pentine streams, and other " pieces of water-works" although derived 
from the East, had its origin in nature. " Even as Paradise itself (says 
Switzer) must have been deemed an immodelled and imperfect plan, had 
it not been watered by the same Omnicient hand which first made it, so 
our gardens and fields, the nearest epitomy and resemblance to that happy 
place which is to be met with here below, cannot be said to be any way 
perfect, or capable of subsisting without it." These men contemplating 
the world as a garden endeavored to copy it in miniature. They con- 
structed lawns for deer and reared diminutive forests for game — they 
formed lakes and stocked them with fish — walks were made on the margin 
of brooks, torrents fell from artificial mountains, and tiny streams wound 
their way through labyrinths of reeds and of sedge. Springs were seen 
bursting out of rocks rudely piled up, as if thrown together by nature, 
while aquatic birds sported in basins below. But they went further, for 
ascending jets were thrown up so as to resemble bundles of reeds, others 
were crested like wheat sheafs, or branched out like trees. Sometimes 
the streams were directed so as to form avenues and alcoves, as of chrystal, 
which when the sun shone produced a magical effect. Even hedges and 
borders of gardens were imitated. " The hedge of water (says Evelyn) 
in forme of lattice-worke which the fontanier caused to ascend out of the 
earth by degrees exceedingly pleased and surprised me." 

Giving the reins still more to their imaginations, these artists were hur- 
ried into singular puerilities. They made the fluid to spout from the sides 
of ships, the mouths of birds, and other incongruous figures. Swarms of 
heathen deities were also pressed into their service ; and not content with 
a Triton blowing water through his shell, or Neptune pouring it from an 
urn, figures of the latter were made to rise from the bottom of deep basins, 
and drawn by spouting dolphins and accompanied with Amphitrite and a 
legion of sea nymphs, sailed over his fluid domains to allay the tempest 
that called him up ! 

Old treatises on water-works are full of such things. In " Art and 
Nature," Neptune is figured " riding on a whale, out of whose nostrils, as 
also out of Neptune's trident the water may bee made to spin thorow small 
pin holes." Other devices consisted of " divers forms and shapes of birds, 
beasts, or fishes ; dragons, swans, whales, flowers, and such like pretty 
conceits, having very small pin holes thorow them for the water to spin 
out at." The 15th and 16th plates of Decaus' Forcible Movements 
represent the mechanism of " an engin by which Galatea is drawn upon 
the water by two dolphins, going in a right line and returning of herself, 
while a Cyclope plaies upon a flajolet." And the 17th and 18th plates 
shew Neptune drawn by sea horses, preceded and followed by Tritons, 
jailing round a rock on which Amphitrite is reposing, and from which 
water is gushing forth. 

Fountains for supplying the inhabitants of towns and cities are frequently 
mentioned in scripture, but it is difficult to discriminate between artificial 
ones and those that were natural. In the early history of Rome some are 
mentioned. The news of the victory obtained over the Tarquins and the 
people of Latium was conveyed in an incredibly short time by two young 
men, said to have been Castor and Pollux, who were met " at the fountain 
in the market-place," at which their horses foaming with sweat were drink- 
ing. (Plutarch in Paulus iEmilius.) Statues of Jupiter Pluvius, of the 
Egyptian god Canopus and others, were erected over fountains, the liquid 
issuing from different and sometimes from all parts of the bodies. On the 
day Julius Caesar was assassinated, he was implored by Calphurnia in 



534 Ancient and Modern Fountains. [Book V. 

consequence of a dream, to remain at home instead of meeting the sena 
tors according to appointment, a circumstance to which Shakespeare thus 
alludes : — 

Decius. Most mighty Caesar, let me know some cause, 

Lest I be laughed at when I tell them so. 
Ccesar. Calphurnia here, ray wife, stays me at home ; 
She dreamt to-night she saw my statue, 
Which like a fountain, with a hundred spouts, 
Did run pure blood, and many lusty Romans 
Came smiling, and did bathe their hands in it. 

Pliny (xxxi, 2.) speaks of a fountain from which water ran " at many 
pipes." From excavations made at Pompeii, it appears that in almost every 
street there was a fountain, and that bronze statues, through which the 
water issued were common. Several have been found — four or five are 
boys of beautiful workmanship ; the fluid issued from vases resting on their 
shoulders or held under their arms, and in some cases from masks. Paint- 
ings of elegant fountains, from which the water issued in perpendicular 
jets from vases, have also been discovered both at Herculaneum and 
Pompeii. 

A circumstance mentioned by Suetonius in his Life of Claudius, the 
successor of Caligula, although not directly related to this part of our sub- 
ject, shows that Roman engineers were quite at home in devices analogous 
to those moving and musical statues, which two centuries ago were so 
common in European fountains. Previous to drawing off the waters of 
the lake Fucinus, the emperor exhibited a naval conflict, in which 19,000 
criminals were engaged against each other in two fleets. An immense 
multitude of spectators attended. Claudius presided dressed in a coat of 
mail, and with him was Agrippina in a mantle of cloth of gold. When 
the two fleets were ready to engage, a Triton of silver rose up in the midst 
of the lake and sounded the charge. 

Of modern street fountains many curious ones are to be seen in Italy, 
France and Germany, while descriptions of others, no longer extant, may 
be found in Misson, Blainville, and other writers of the last century. Thirty 
folding plates, representing some of the most remarkable, are attached to 
Switzer's Hydrostatics. A colossal statue of Jupiter Pluvius, in a singu- 
lar stooping position, was designed for a fountain at Tratolino, by John of 
Bologna. The extremities are of stone, but the trunk is formed of bricks 
overlaid with cement that has acquired the hardness of marble. A num- 
ber of apartments are constructed within it — one in the head is lighted 
through the eye-balls, which serve as windows. To add to the extraordi- 
nary effect, a kind of crown is formed by little jetteux that drop on the 
shoulders and trickle down the figure, shedding a sort of supernatural 
lustre when irradiated by the sun. One hand of the figure rests on the 
rock as if to support itself, while the other is placed on the head of a lion, 
from the mouth of which the principal stream issues. 

A fountain designed by Michael Angelo is described by Sir Henry 
Wotton as ' a matchless pattern,' being ' the figure of a sturdy woman, wash- 
ing and winding linen clothes ; in which act she wrings out the water that 
made the fountain, which was a graceful and natural conceit in the arti- 
ficer, implying this rule that all designs of this kind should be proper.' 

Of remarkable fountains at Nuremberg, Blainville has noticed several. 
Of one he observes, " Its basin is an octagon in the middle of which stands 
a large brass pillar ; from its chapiters project six muzzles of lions, each 
of which spurts water into the air out of a twisted pipe. On the cornish 
are the six cardinal virtues, which squirt water from their breasts. On tl is 



Chap. 7.] Shakespeare, Drayton and Spencer quoted. 535 

pillar stands a less one fluted, upon which are six infants, every one of 
whom leans on an escutcheon bearing the arms of the empire, those of 
Nuremberg and other towns ; they are all of them sounding trumpets, out 
of which water jets in plenty. On the top of this second pillar is a fine 
statue of Justice, with her sword in one hand and her balance in the other ; 
she likewise sends water from her breasts, and supports herself upon a 
large ostrich which spouts water most bountifully. All this is in brass 
surrounded with an iron grate carved and gilt." (Travels, i, 197.) 

Another at Augsburg he thus describes : "In the middle of the basin is 
a double pedestal, at the foot of which are several sphinxes and statues 
jetting water into the basin, some by the mouth, others by their breasts, 
and three by trumpet-marines. On the four corners of the first pedestal 
are four fine statues big as life ; their feet rest upon four very large shells 
into which they pour water, some out of vases, others in another fashion. 
Upon the top of the second pedestal is a Hercules combating the Lernean 
Hydra." (Ibid. 291.) 

Old writers represent Brussels as well supplied with water 150 years 
ago as Rome itself. There were twenty public fountains at the corners 
of the principal streets, and all adorned with statues. In the herb-market 
were figures of four beautiful females " squeezing water out of their 
breasts" — a favorite device, and another equally popular was adopted in 
a splendid fountain near the Carmelite church in the same city : " Tout 
pres de cette Eglise est le Manneke-pis, c'estla statue d'un garcon, elevee 
sur une colonne ; du haut, de laquelle il jette de 1'eau, comme s'il pissoit, 
par sa pipe, jour et nuit, dans un bassin qui est au pied de la colonne. 
C'est une des sept merveilleuses fontaines de la ville." (Le Curieux 
Antiquaire, tome i, 175.) 

Shakespeare often alludes to the figures of old English fountains. In 
Winter's Tale, Act iv, Scene I, he compares the old shepherd to " a weather 
bitten conduit of many king's reigns ;" that is, to a statue from which the 
water flowed. Henley in commenting on the passage observes : " Con- 
duits representing a human figure were heretofore not uncommon. One 
of this kind, a female form, and loeathcr beaten still exists at Hoddesdon in 
Herts." In As You like It, Rosalind says, she will weep " like Diana in 
the fountain" — an allusion to that erected at Paul's Cross, where, after the 
religious images had been destroyed, (see page 106,) " there was set up 
a curious wrought tabernacle of gray marble, and in the same an alabaster 
image of Diana, and water conveyed from the Thames, prilling from her 
naked breast," 

Drayton, a poet contemporary with Shakespeare, alludes to fountains 
and their basins in his Quest of Cynthia. 

At length I on a fountain light, 

Whose brim with pinks was platted, 
The banks with daffodilies dight 

With grass, like sleave was matted. 

And Spencer in the Fairy Queen — 

And in the midst of all a fountaine stood, 
Of richest substance that on earth might bee, 

So pure and shiny, that the silver flood 
Through every channel running one might see. 

Fountains have always been indispensable adjuncts in oriental gardens, 
and they doubtless formed conspicuous objects in those of Babylon. The 
two fountains in the gardens of Alcinous, from their elevated position and 



536 Fountains in Pliny's Gardens. [Book "V 

the abundance of water they poured forth, must have greatly contributed 
to the beauty and effect of the surrounding scenery. 

Two plenteous fountains the whole prospect crown'd : 

This through the garden leads its streams around, 

Visits each plant and waters all the ground ; 

While that in pipes beneath the palace flows, 

And thence its current on the town bestows. Ody. vii. Pope. 

The younger Pliny's description of his Tuscan villa contains the only 
detailed account extant of an ancient Roman garden. As might be sup- 
posed, fountains and jets d'eau frequently occur. The front of the house 
faced the south and had several porticos. The terrace was embellished 
with hedges of box, and the lawn overspread with the soft acanthus. At 
one end of the front portico a dining room opened on the terrace, and 
opposite the centre of the portico there was a small area shaded by four 
plane trees, " in the midst of which a fountain rises, from whence the 
water running over the edges of a marble basin, gently refreshes the sur- 
rounding plane trees and the verdure underneath them." In the same 
vicinity he describes " a little fountain playing through several small pipes 
into a vase." Speaking of the view from the front windows of a spacious 
chamber, he observes, they look " upon a cascade, which entertains at once 
both the eye and the ear, for the water dashing from a great height foams 
over the marble basin that receives it below." 

After mentioning bathing rooms and other apartments, walks, meadows, 
groves, trees, &c. Pliny continues — " In one place you have a little mea- 
dow, in another the box is cut into a thousand different forms, sometimes 
into letters, expressing the name of the master, sometimes that of the artist ; 
whilst here and there little obelisks rise, intermixed alternate with fruit 
trees ; when on a sudden in the midst of this elegant regularity you are 
surprised with an imitation of the negligent beauties of rural nature. In 
the centre is a spot surrounded with a knot of dwarf plane trees. Beyond 
these is a wall planted with the smooth and twining acanthus, where the 
trees are also cut into a variety of names and shapes. At the upper end 
is an alcove of white marble shaded with vines, supported by four small 
Carystian pillars. From the bench [or triclinium, a species of couch on 
which the Romans reclined to eat] the water gushing through several 
little pipes, as if it were pressed out by the weight of the persons who 
repose themselves upon it, falls into a stone cistern underneath, whence it 
is received into a fine polished marble basin, so artfully contrived that it 
is always full without ever overflowing. When I sup here this basin 
serves for a table, the largest sort of dishes being placed round the margin, 
while the smaller ones swim about in the form of little vessels and water- 
fowls. Corresponding to this is a fountain which is incessantly emptying 
and filling ; for the water which it throws to a great height, falling back 
into it, is by means of two openings returned as fast as it is received." 
This must have been either a modification of Heron's fountain, (No. 163,) 
in which the water would appear to be returned, or some concealed force 
pump threw it back. 

The practice of eating, and even of sleeping, in gardens during the 
summer months, has always been more or less common in the East. In 
Solomon's Song it is obviously alluded to. " Thou that dwellest in the 
gardens," that " feedeth among the lilies, in a fountain of gardens," or 
rather a garden of fountains. Indeed a great part of this song seems to 
refer to that season, (and anxiety for its approach,) when the custom was 
for the wealthy to remove, like Pliny, to their country villas. It was very 
common with the rich Greeks and Romans, as well as with the Jews and 



Chap. 7.] Singular Fountains at Pratolino. 537 

other Asiatics, " when the winter was past, the rain over and gone ; when 
the flowers appeared on the earth, and the time of the singing of birds 
was come, and the voice of the turtle heard in the land ; when the fig tree 
put forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grapes gave a good 
smell" — to hie away to their villas, and in the figurative language of the 
East, to dwell in gardens and feed among lilies. The custom is based on 
some of the finest feelings of our nature, and it is on such occasions only 
that we can realize some of the most exquisite pleasures which our pro- 
genitors in Eden enjoyed. Motezuma, we are informed by Solis, took 
peculiar pleasure in supping in his gardens, in which were numerous foun 
tains and flowers " of delightful variety and fragrance." 

That the Jews had fountains in their gardens and often washed in the 
basins during the heats of summer, we learn from the accounts of Bath- 
sheba and Susannah. The fountains doubtless being shaded with foliage 
and trees like those mentioned by Pliny. 

Cato the censor, that terrible scourge of the luxurious Romans, ren- 
dered himself generally obnoxious by the reformations he introduced. 
Among other measures, " he cut off the pipes by which people conveyed 
water from the public fountains into their nouses and gardens" probably 
on account of its excessive waste in ornamental water-works. Plutarch 
has quoted an epigram, from which we learn that the physiognomy of this 
celebrated man, like that of Socrates and Phocion, was not very pre- 
possessing. 

With eyes so grey and hair so red, 

With tusks so sharp and keen, 

Thou '1 fright the shades when thou art dead, 

And hell wont let thee in. Langhorne's Trans 

To give an account of modern street and garden fountains would be 
an endless task. Descriptions of the most remarkable, as those in the 
gardens of Frescati and Versailles, are too common to need repetition here. 
We shall therefore merely notice a few singular ones. 

There is no doubt that the general features and essential parts of ancient 
fancy water-works were preserved in those of modern Italy, whence they 
were, including water-organs, spread over the rest of Europe. A sketch 
of those in the gardens at Pratolino will give, says an old writer, a general 
idea of other Italian works of the kind. " Besides Tritons, Cupids, and 
other statues which on a sudden cover you with water, other streams 
issue from between rows of trees, &c. You are led into a grotto, of 
which the roof alone is said to have cost 30,000 ducats, being all of coral, 
mother of pearl, and other costly materials ; the walls are lined with the 
same, and the pilasters adorned with an organ, which by means of water 
plays several tunes. Here your eyes are diverted with a great variety 
of moving figures : the god Pan strikes up a melodious tune with his 
mouth, at the sight of his mistress standing before him. In another grot, 
an angel carries a trumpet, puts it to his mouth, and gives you a tune upon 
it. In another, a clown carries a dish of water to a serpent , which lifts up 
its head and drinks it. Here you have a mill grinding olives — in another 
a paper mill with the hammers going. The grotto of Galatea shows her 
coming out of a door in a sea chariot with two nymphs, and having sailed 
a while upon the water she returns the way she came. In the basin is a 
large dolphin carrying a naked woman on his back, and swimming about 
with several other figures, all moving as if alive. In another place, you 
see a curious round table fit to receive fifteen guests, having a fountain 
playing in the midst, while other streams play between every two persons 
and supply them with water to cool their wine. The woman of Samaria 

6S 



538 Musical Fountains — Artificial Trees. [Book V. 

appears next, coming out of her house with two buckets, and having filled 
them, goes back the same way. Meantime you are diverted with smiths 
thumping, mills going, and birds chirping on trees — all which are set to 
work by the water." 

In Dr. H. Brown's Travels, (Lond. 1685,) are figures of one or two 
ancient fountains — one, in Carinthia, of the form of a dragon, from whose 
mouth the water issued. 

In the year 916, an embassy proceeded from Constantinople to Bagdad 
and was received with much pomp by the Caliph Moctader. " In the 
midst of the great hall in which he gave audience to the ambassadors 
was a tree of massy gold, which had (amongst others) eighteen principal 
branches, whereon were birds of gold and silver, which clapped their 
wings, and warbled various notes." — (Martigny's History of the Arabians, 
iii, 323.) 

Marco Paulo, in the 13th century, mentions a fountain in the gardens 
of the " Old man of the Mountain," which gave out wine, milk, and a 
mixture of honey and water. 

Rubriques, in the same century, saw a silver tree at the court of the 
Great Khan, which poured forth milk and wines of different kinds. At 
the foot were four lions, through each of which passed a tube. On the 
summit was the figure of an angel holding a trumpet, and which by some 
interior mechanism was made to sound. It was the work of a French 
goldsmith. 

This predilection for trees as ornaments for fountains and gardens seems 
to have been of a more ancient date. The palm tree of brass, which was 
consecrated to Apollo by Nicias, and placed in a field or garden purchased 
by him, probably served for a fountain. It must have been of enormous 
dimensions, since a fragment that was blown off by a storm of wind, " fall- 
ing upon a large statue demolished it." (Plutarch in Nicias.) The 
pedestal of this statue has been discovered. A golden statue of Pallas, 
Plutarch observes, was erected in the temple of Delphi on a palm tree 
of brass, which had golden fruit. There are two other celebrated trees 
mentioned in history, but their uses are not indicated. We learn from 
Herodotus, vii, 27, that Pythius, a native of Lydia, presented Darius with 
a plane tree of gold. It was worth 5 J millions sterling according to Mont- 
faucon. The golden vine of Aristobolus was valued at 400 talents. It 
was carried through Rome in Pompey's third triumph, and afterward 
deposited in the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus. Another one, which 
Alexander took at the sack of Thebes, was preserved at Rome in the 
temple of Apollo in Pliny's time. This author has a remark on the decay 
of the art of working brass, which may here be noticed. He observes, 
in former times the artists worked to wm fame and glory, " but now as in 
all things else for gain and lucre only," (xxxiv, chap. 2.) 

One of the fountains at Versailles was in the form of an oak tree, from 
which the liquid was dispersed in all directions. (It is figured in one of 
the plates attached to Switzer's work.) 

Among the garden water-works atChatsworth were, " 1. Neptune with 
his nymphs, who seem to sport in the waters, let out by a cock in several 
columns, and falling upon sea- weeds ; 2. a pond where sea-horses con- 
tinually roll ; 3. a tree of copper, resembling a willow, and by the turning 
of a cock every leaf drops water, which represents a shower ; 4. a grove 
of cypress and a cascade with two sea nymphs at top with jars under 
their arms ; 5. at the bottom of the cascade a pond with an artificial rose, 
through which by the turning of a cock the water ascends, and hangs in 



CLap. 7.] Fountains in Ancient Theatres. 539 

the air in the figure of that flower ; 6. another pond with Mercury point- 
ing at the gods and throwing up water." — Lond. Mag. 1752, p. 7. 

Bell, in his account of the Russian embassy to Ispahan, notices those in 
the i gardens of the Scah. In front of the Hall of Audience was " a large 
fountain of pure water, which springs upward in three pipes and falls 
into a basin filled with roses, jessamines, and many other fine flowers.'* 

In one of the public gardens of Brussels, among other water- works was 
an hydraulic organ. — (Le Curieux Antiquaire, tome i, 175.) 

The old device of artificial music combined with fountains, is thus men- 
tioned in the 17th Proposition of Worcester's Century of Inventions : — 
" How to make upon the Thames a floating garden of pleasure, with trees, 
flowers, banqueting houses and fountains, stews for all kinds of fishes, a 
reserve for snow to keep wine in, delicate bathing places and the like ; 
with music made with mills, and all in the midst of the stream where it is 
most rapid. 

Fountains were often placed within ancient public buildings as well as 
near them. They were common appendages to temples, and the custom, 
as mentioned in our first book, is still retained by the Turks and other 
Asiatics. Henry Blount visited Adrianople in 1624, and in describing 
the mosque, says, there were " tenne conduits with cocks on the north 
side, and as many on the south for people to wash before divine ser- 
vice ; to which use also on the west side in the church-yard, are thirty or 
forty cocks under a fountain, so sumptuous, as excepting one at Palermo, 
I have not seen a better in Christendome." — (A Voyage into the Levant, 
Lond. 1638.) 

During hot weather, Augustus the Roman emperor slept (observes 
Suetonius) with his chamber doors open, " and frequently in a portico with 
waters playing around him." 

"In the middle of the square of the Coliseum is a pretty remarkable 
piece of antiquity, (says Blainville,) though very little minded by most 
people. Here stood anciently a beautiful fountain, adorned with the finest 
marbles and columns ; and on the top was a bronze statue of Jupiter, 
from which issued great plenty of water, as may be seen on the reverse 
of one of Titus' medals. They called it Meta Sudans : meta, because it 
was made in the form of a goal ; and sudans, sweating, because of the 
water running from the several parts of the statue. This fountain was of 
great use both to the spectators and the gladiators in the amphitheatre to 
refresh themselves. Pope Alexander VII. caused it to be repaired, but 
since his time it has been entirely neglected." — (Travels, vol. ii, 535.) 

The theatres of the Romans were fitted up with numerous concealed 
pipes that passed in every direction along the walls, and were connected 
to cisterns of water or to machines for raising the latter. Certain parts of 
the pipes were very minutely perforated, and were so arranged that by 
turning one or more cocks, the liquid escaped from them and descended 
upon the audience in the form of dew or extremely fine rain. This effec- 
tually cooled the heated air, and must have been exceedingly refreshing 
to the immense multitudes, especially in such a climate as Italy. On 
some occasions the water was scented with the richest perfumes. Thus 
Hadrian, in honor of Trajan his father, commanded water impregnated 
with saffron and balsam to be sprinkled on the people at the theatres. 
The dining rooms of Nero's golden house were ceiled in such a manner, 
that the attendants could make it rain either flowers or liquid perfumes. 
At one feast 100,000 crowns were expended in perfumed waters. Sue- 
tonius says they were discharged from " secret pipes." The statues that 
adorned the interior of the theatres were made to sweat perfumes on the 



540 Fountains in Theatres and Churches recommended. [Book V. 

audience. This was accomplished by making them hollow, drilling in 
them an infinite number of small holes, and connecting them by secret 
tubes to reservoirs of scented waters. The practice is alluded to by several 
authors, and among others by Lucan in the following passage : — 

As when mighty Rome's spectators meet 
In the full theatre's capacious seat; 
At once by secret pipes and channels fed 
Rich tinctures gush from every antique head *, 
At once, ten thousand saffron currents flow, 
And rain their odors on the crowd below. 

Sometimes rich people left by their wills sums of money to furnish 
these perfumes and the apparatus for dispersing them. An example is 
given by Maffei in his ' History of Ancient Amphitheatres.' (Lond. 1730, 
p. 168.) A Roman lady bequeathed funds to celebrate a hunting of wild 
beasts in the amphitheatre, and she ordered that salientes should be made. 
This term Maffei understood to mean " those hidden channels or pipes by 
which with wonderful artifice, [as is twice mentioned by Seneca,] they 
caused odoriferous liquid to spring up from the bottom to the top of the 
amphitheatre, which then jetted and spread itself in the air like a very 
fine shower of rain." 

The custom might be adopted with advantage in modern theatres : it 
would render visits to these crowded places more agreeable and less in- 
jurious to health. Why can't the managers announce it in their " bills," 
among other inducements, just as their predecessors did eighteen centuries 
since '{ One of the notices of a public entertainment in Pompeii has been 
found written on the walls of a bath in that city. It is in these words : — 
" On occasion of the dedication of the baths, at the expense of Cneeus 
Alleius Nigidius Maius, there will be the chase of wild beasts, athletic 
contests, sprinkling of perfumes, and an awning." — (Pompeii, vol. i, 148.) 

Fountains for cooling the air should constitute part of the ordinary ap- 
pendages to churches, as much as apparatus for heating and lighting them. 
They should be considered by us, as they were by the ancients, essential to 
the health as well as comfort of large assemblies of people. They certainly 
are as necessary here, especially in the Southern states, as they were in 
southern Europe. Their construction is so simple, their modifications so 
various, their application so universal, and their effects so beneficial and 
cheap, that it is surprising they have not been introduced. We don't see 
why a person might not be as innocently employed in pumping water 
during worship to supply a fountain or jet d'eau, as in pumping air into the 
pipes of an organ. But it is unnecessary, for where the fluid would not 
rise sufficiently high from public reservoirs or pipes that pass through the 
streets, it might be elevated into a reservoir in the roof the day previous 
to the sabbath. In this use of fountains ancient architects were clearly 
in advance of ours. 

The custom of cooling the air in private apartments is of great antiquity 
in Asia, and is still kept up in the dwellings of princes. See a plate 
in Generale Histoire, tome xiii, p. 311, representing a private apartment 
in the seraglio of one of the generals of Aurengzebe. An octagon basin 
with a handsome jet is in the centre of the room, with irrages of birds 
floating in the water. On the borders of the basin are trays with refresh- 
ments, and the company reclining around on carpets, much in the same 
manner in which Pliny represents himself and friends feasting around a 
fountain in his garden. 

Henry Blount describing one of the palaces at Cairo in 1624, observes, 
M In the chiefe dining chamber, according to the capacitie of the roome, is 



Chap. 7.J Ancient Fountains for Cattle. 541 

made one or more richly gilt fountains, which through secret pipes sup- 
plies in the middle of the roome a daintie poole, which is so neatly kept, 
the water so cleare, as makes apparent the exquisite mosaik at the bot- 
tome. Herein are preserved fish which have often taken bread out of my 
hand." 

Sometimes the jet is made to fall into basins filled with flowers, the 
odor of which is dispersed in the spray. Bell describes the hall of audi- 
ence at Ispahan as a most magnificent room, lined with mirrors of various 
sizes, the floor covered with carpets of silk interwoven with branches 
and foliage of gold and silver. In the centre were two basins in which 
several pipes spouted water that fell among roses and other flowers and 
produced a fine effect. Another fountain at the entrance threw the water 
so high that it fell like a thick rain or dew which concealed the Schah from 
those on the opposite side. 

See remarks on the introduction of portable fountains into private dwel- 
lings at page 361. 




No. 271. Ancient fountain for cattle. 

That ancient farmers occasionally conveyed water through pipes into 
fields for the use of their stock, as is now sometimes done, appears from 
the above cut, from a basso relievo preserved in one of the museums at 
Rome. — (D'Agincourt's History of the Fine Arts. Sculp. Plate I.) 

It has already been remarked, (pp. 163, 170,) that the old Mexicans and 
Peruvians had fountains, from which the fluid issued through figures of 
snakes and crocodiles. 

There is reason to believe that three and four way-cocks were anciently 
employed in fountains : they are to be found in the old water-works of 
Italy and France. — (See L'Art du Plombier in Arts et Metieres, 4to. edit, 
p. 560, planche xiii.) 



542 Clepsydra — Sun-Dials — Slow Matches. [BookV. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Clepsydr.se and Hydraulic Organs: Time measured by the sun— Obelisks — Dial in Syracuse — 
Time measured in the night by slow matches, candles, &c. — Modes of announcing the hours — " Jack of 
the clock"— Clepsydrae— Their curious origin in Egypt— Their variety— Used by the Siamese, Hindoos, 
Chinese, <fec. — Ancient hour-glasses — Indexes to water-clocks — Sand clocks in China — Musical clock of 
Plato— Clock carried in triumph by Pompey— Clepsydra of Ctesibius— Clock presented to Charles V. — 
Modern Clepsydrae— Hour-glasses in coffins— Dial of the Peruvians. Hydraulic Organs: Imperfectly 
described by Heron and Vitruvius — Plato, Archimedes, Plutarch, Pliny, Suetonius, St. Jerome— Organs 
sent from Constantinople to Pepin — Water organs of Louis Debonnaire — A woman expired in ecstacies 
while hearing one play — Organs made by monks — Old Regal. 

Clepsydrae and water organs are not strictly included in the general 
design of this volume ; but as they are ancient devices in which water 
performed an important part, and as they undoubtedly contributed to the 
improvement of hydraulic machinery, and moreover gave rise to clocks 
and watches, we were unwilling to omit them. 

Sun-dials were the earliest means employed to note the lapse of time. 
Country people in all ages have marked the passing hours by the shadow 
of a tree, a post, the corner of a house, or any other permanent object ; 
these were natural gnomons, while the ground upon which their shadows 
were thrown served as dials. In cities, artificial objects were necessary ; 
hence the obelisks of the Egyptians and other ancient people. These gno- 
mons were placed in open and conspicuous places for public convenience, 
and many of them from their great elevation threw their shadows to a 
considerable distance. Sometimes their pedestals formed magnificent 
buildings. When Dion, after delivering the Syracusans, spake to them 
on the tyranny of Dionysius, Plutarch says, he stood upon a lofty sun-dial 
erected by the tyrant : " at first it was considered by the soothsayers a 
good omen that Dion, when he addressed the people, had under his feet 
the stately edifice which Dionysius had erected ; but upon reflecting that 
this edifice on which he had been declared general, was a sun-dial, they 
were apprehensive his present power might fall into speedy decline." 
" The dial of Ahaz" seems to have been a public building of a similar 
description. The governors of provinces in China assemble on the " time- 
telling towers" on public occasion. (Atlas Chinensis of Montanus, p. 594.) 
The Peruvians had pillars erected for measuring time by the sun. Small 
dials were anciently made of brass or other metals and placed upon columns, 
or were attached to public buildings. Vitruvius has described several 
in book ix. of his Architecture, and among them one by Berosus the 
Chaldean. 

But dials are only serviceable while the sun shines. During cloudy 
weather and after sun-set they are useless ; other devices are therefore 
required to mark the fleeting hours. Of ancient contrivances for this pur- 
pose there were two whose action depended one upon fire and the other 
on water, viz : by burning slow matches, powder, or candles, and by 
water-clocks. The former were used by the Anglo-Saxons, (see p. 350,) 
and are still common in Japan, and probably other Asiatic countries. 
Nieuhoff, in his account of the Dutch embassy to China, says, the Chinese 



Chap.. 8.] Striking the Hours — Ancient Water-Clocks. 543 

have instruments to show the hour of the day which operate by fire and 
water. Those that depend upon fire " are made of perfumed ashes." 
(Ogilby's Trans. 1673, p. 159.) This is too vague to convey an idea of 
their construction ; but from Thunberg's account of those he saw in Japan, 
we- at once learn what they were. For the mensuration of time, observes 
that enlightened traveler, the Japanese use the bark of the skimmi (anise 
tree) finely powdered. A box, 12 inches long, being filled with ashes, 
small furrow s are made in the ashes from one end of the box to the other, 
and so on backwards and forwards to a considerable number. In these 
furrows is strewed fine powder of skimmi bark, and divisions are made 
for the hours. The powder is ignited at one end of a groove, it consumes 
very slowly, and the hours are proclaimed by striking the bells of the 
temples. (Travels, iii, 228.) Time is also measured in Japan by burn- 
ing matches, twisted like ropes and divided by knots. When one of these 
after being lighted has burned down to a knot, and thereby denoted the 
lapse of a certain portion of time, an attendant announces it by a certain 
number of strokes on bells near their temples, if in the day time ; but in 
the night, by striking two pieces of wood against each other. — (Ibid. 88.) 

In all ancient devices, the passing hours were announced by men ap- 
pointed for the purpose, a custom still continued over all Asia. Sometimes 
it was done by the voice. Thus the Turks have an officer (with strong 
lungs) on the top of every mosque who, stopping his ears with his fingers, 
proclaims with a loud voice the break of day, noon, three in the afternoon, 
and twilight. Martial the Roman satirist, refers to a similar practice, and 
Athenseus mentions " a mercenary hour-teller." Allusions to the same 
custom are to be found in the Bible — that which ye have spoken in 
closets "shall be proclaimed upon the house tops." But the more general 
mode was that which is still so common in the East, viz. by striking a bell, 
drum, gong, or some other sonorous instrument, and distinguishing the 
different hours, as in our clocks, by the number of strokes. In modern ages 
in Europe before the striking parts of town clocks were invented, men 
struck the hour on a bell, and long after these officers were dispensed with 
figures of men were made as ornaments to perform the same duty. To 
these " Jacks of the clock," Shakespeare and other writers of his age often 
refer. Such clocks are still extant : the one attached to St. Dunstan's 
church near Temple Bar, London, is often mentioned by writers of the 
last century, and we believe is still to be seen. 

Some authors attribute the invention of water-clocks to Ctesibius, and 
others suppose they were first used under the Ptolemies ; but both are 
mistakes : they were doubtless greatly improved by the Alexandrian 
mathematician, and probably reached the acme of perfection under the 
successors of Alexander. In India, Egypt, Chaldea and China, clepsydrae 
date back beyond all records. They were known at an early period in 
Greece. Plutarch mentions them in his life of Alcibiades, who flourished 
in the fifth century B. C. when they were employed in the tribunals at 
Athens to measure the time to which the orators were limited in their 
addresses to the judges. Demosthenes and his great rival iEschines 
allude to this use of them. Plato had water-clocks, and to him was attri- 
buted their introduction into Greece. Plutarch in his Philosophy, observes, 
that Empedocles illustrated the act of respiration by " a clepsidre water 
hour-glass." (Opin. of Philos.) Julius Caesar found the Britons in pos- 
session of them. Pliny (book vii, 60.) says, men announced with the voice 
the hours from the shadow of the sun, and that Scipio Nasica set up the first 
clepsydra " to divide the hours of both day and night equally, by water 
distilling and dropping out of one vessel into another." 



544 Egyptian, Siamese, and Hindoo Water- Clocks. [BookV. 

The ancients had various modifications of water-clocks, some were ex- 
ceedingly simple, and others elaborately constructed, and the forms and 
decorations wonderfully diversified ; but the principle was more or less 
the same in all, viz. water trickling through a minute channel from one 
vessel into another. The instruments were made of various materials 
from glass to gold, and of sizes differing, like modern clocks, from large 
ones permanently erected for public use to such as were carried in the 
hand. 

Valerianus, who wrote in the 16th century, says the priests of Egypt 
divided the day into twelve hours, because the cynocephalus, a sacred ani- 
mal, was observed to make a violent noise at those times, and to void urine 
as often. Cicero mentions a tradition of Trismegistus observing the same 
thing. The Egyptians, therefore, ornamented their water-clocks with 
figures of apes, and some were of the form of those animals urinating ; 
hence it would seem that this singular people not only derived enemas 
from studying the habits of the ibis, but were led to construct clepsydrae 
from noticing those of monkeys. 

As it is impossible to give anything like a history of these machines in 
this volume, we shall notice a few only, but sufficient to give a general idea 
of their construction and variety. Sometimes an empty basin with a 
minute opening through its bottom was placed floating in a cistern of 
water ; the fluid gradually entering filled it in an hour, half an hour, or 
some other determinate time. It was then emptied and allowed to swim 
as before ; as soon as it became filled, a gong or other instrument was 
sounded for the information of the public. 

" The Siamese measure their time by a sort of water-clock, not like the 
clepsydra of old, wherein the water descended from above, but by forcing 
it upwards through a small hole in the bottom of a copper cup placed in 
a tub of water. When the water has sprung up so long that the cup is 
full, it sinks down, and those that stand by it, forthwith make a noise with 
basons, signifying that the hour is expired." (Ovington's Voyage to Surat 
in 16S9, p. 281.) 

The ghurree al, or clepsydra of the Hindoos, consists of a thin brass cup 
having a hole in the bottom. "A large vessel is filled with water and this 
cup placed on the surface ; the water rises through the hole, and when it 
has reached a height marked by a line previously adjusted, the watchman 
strikes the hour with a wooden mallet on a pan of bell metal." — (Sho- 
berl's Hind, v, 157.) 

In other devices, time was measured by emptying the vessel. Valeria- 
nus observes, that the priests of Acanta, a town beyond the Nile, poured 
water every day into a vessel, by the dropping of which through a small 
hole they measured the hours. — (Harris' Lex. Tech.) 

Dr. Fryer, who visited India in the 17th century, observed the Hin- 
doos measuring time " by the dropping of water out of a brass basin."— 
(Travels, 186.) 

It is obvious that by adapting the size of an opening in the bottom of a 
vessel, the entire contents of the latter might be made to flow out in a 
certain time and with tolerable accuracy ; but in refilling it great care 
was required to introduce precisely the same quantity. To accomplish 
this, both the vessel and receiver were closed on all sides and connected 
together, so that when the proper quantity of fluid was once introduced, 
it could neither escape by leakage or evaporation. Both vessels were 
shaped like a pear and united at the smaller ends, through which the passage 
for the fluid was made ; and sometimes sand was used instead of water. 
Hence the hour-glass of modern days, the only modification of ancient 



Chap. 8.] Ancient Hour-Glasses — Chinese Sand and Water -Clocks. 545 

clepsydrae which modern nations continue to use. Nieuhoff observes of 
Chinese water-clocks, " they bear a resemblance to some great hour- 
glasses in shape ;" and he says, in several sand was used instead of water. 
On an ancient bas-relief at Rome, representing the marriage of Thetis and 
Peleus, Morpheus holds an hour-glass ; and from Athenaeus we learn that 
the ancients carried portable ones about with them somewhat as we* do 
watches. 

In another variety of clepsydrae, the sides of the vessel from which the 
fluid escaped were graduated, somewhat like chemists' measuring glasses, 
and the hours announced as the descending surface of the fluid reached 
the marks. If the vessel was of a cylindrical or cubical figure the distance 
between the marks was not uniform, because the water escaped fastest at 
first, in consequence of the greater pressure of the column over the orifice, 
which pressure constantly diminished with the efflux ; the surface of the 
fluid could not therefore descend through equal spaces in equal times. 
When such formed vessels were used, the relative distances of the marks 
were probably determined by experiment, although they might have been 
by calculation. Sometimes the vessels were funnel-shaped, the angle of 
their sides being so adjusted that an equal distance could be preserved 
between the marks — unequal quantities of the fluid escaping in equal 
times. These instruments were generally made of glass, and a cork or 
some floating image, to which a needle was secured, pointed out the hour 
as the water sunk. Pancirollus says, tho small holes were edged with 
gold. 

In some clepsydrae the fluid was received into a separate vessel to raise 
a floating image that pointed as an index to the hours. Sometimes a boy 
with a rod, Time with his scythe, and Death with a dart. In this variety 
of the instrument, it was desirable that the quantity of fluid discharged into 
the vessel should be uniform at all times ; and to effect this, the floating 
siphon, No. 239, was sometimes used. Such we presume was the clepsydra 
of Orontes, which was made " in the form of a small ship floating on the 
water, and which emptied itself by means of a siphon placed in the middle 
of it." Dr. Harris, not aware of the property of a floating siphon, could 
not perceive how the hours were made equal by this contrivance, which, 
he observes, Orontes devised to remedy the unequal flow of water from 
an open vessel. — (Lex. Tech.) 

Nieuhoff noticing the numerous towns in China, upon the greater part 
of which, he observes, were clepsydrae, says, " upon the clock-house tur- 
rets stands an instrument which shows the hour of the day by means of 
water, which running from one vessel into another raises a board, upon 
which is portrayed a mark for the time of day ; and you are to observe, 
there is always a person to notice the time, who every hour signifies the 
same to the people by beating upon a drum, and hanging out a board with 
the hour writ upon it in large letters." (Ogilby, Trans. 196.) Montanus 
says these letters were " a foot and a half long." See also Purchas'Pil- 
grimage, 499. 

In another class of ancient clepsydrae, the water dropped upon an over- 
shot wheel, which turned an index in the centre of a circle, round which 
the hours were marked ; hence our clock and watch dials. " The Chinese 
have other instruments to know the hour of the day, being somewhat like 
our clocks with wheels, and they are made to turn with sand as mill- 
wheels are with water." (Nieuhoff.) At last solid weights were intro- 
duced in place of water, and by means of cords gave motion to the index, 
and thus opened the way still more for the introduction of modern clocks. 

It would appear from the description of clepsydrae by Vitruvius and 

69 



546 Wafer- Clock carried in Pompey's Triumph. [Book V. 

other writers, that the ancients had carried these machines to very great 
perfection ; and as regards ornament, they probably excelled many of 
our mantel time pieces. They were even combined with music. Thus 
Plato had one that, during the night, when the index of the dial could not 
be seen, announced the time by playing upon flutes. Atheneeus also con- 
structed one that indicated the hours by sounds, produced by the com- 
pression and expulsion of air by water — the same principle as Plato's. 
Petrarch in enumerating the spoils of Asia which Pompey exhibited at 
his third triumph, besides cups, chests and beds of gold, a mountain of the 
same metal, with statues of harts, lions and other beasts ; trees, and all 
kinds of fruits formed of pearls suspended from golden branches, &c. 
continues, " Of the same substance, there was a cloche, so cunningly 
wrought that the woorkmanshyp excelled the stuffe, and which conti- 
nually moved and turned about — a right woonderfull and strange sight." 
— (" Phisicke against Fortune," translated by T. Twyne. Lond. 1579, 
F. 120.) 

The want of uniformity in the going of ancient water-clocks was noticed 
by Seneca, and compared to the differences of opinions entertained by 
philosophers ; and Charles V. after shedding rivers of blood to make men 
believe the dogmas he wished to impose, amused himself in his retire- 
ment in the construction of watches, and was surprised that he could not 
make two go alike. 

No. 272 represents one of the improved clepsydras of Ctesibius, a from 
Perrault's Translation of Vitruvius. b It presents several interesting par- 
ticulars relating to the state of the useful arts upwards of twenty centuries 
ago, and is better calculated to impart information to mechanics respect- 
ing the ingenuity, and even the workshops and tools, of their ancient 
brethren, than reams of letter-press. Besides carving, turning, found- 
ing, &c. &c. — it shows the practical application of water to move over- 
shot wheels — the art of transmitting motion and of changing its direction 
by toothed wheels — it exhibits the same principle of measuring time as 
practised by our clock and watch-makers, viz. by proportioning the num- 
ber of teeth on wheels to those on the pinions between which they work. 
The application of the siphon is also interesting, being the same as is used 
to illustrate the action of intermitting springs. Upon this instrument the 
renewal of the diurnal movements of the machinery depended : its effect 
being similar to that of winding up an ordinary clock. 

This clepsydra consisted of a cylindrical column placed on a square 
pedestal, within which the mechanism was concealed. The hours for 
both day and night were marked upon the column ; their inequality at 
different seasons being measured by unequal distances between the curved 
lines and by the revolution of the column round its axis once a year. On 
the pedestal are seen the figures of two boys, one of which was immove- 
able, but the other rose and pointed out the different hours with his wand. 
Water (supplied from some reservoir by a concealed pipe) continually 
dropped from the eyes of the figure on the left, and falling into a dish 
was conveyed, by a horizontal channel, under the feet of the other figure, 
where it trickled into a deep vessel, or large vertical tube, whose lower 
end was closed. In this tube a float was made to rise and fall with the 
water, and being attached to the feet of the figure with the wand caused 
it to rise also, and thus to indicate the lapse of time. At the end of 24 

* There was another ancient philosopher of the same name, Ctesibius of Chalcis. 
b Tn Barbaro's Vilruvius, Venice, 1567, there are figures of two others equally inge- 
nious, but rather more complex. 



Chap. 8.] Water-Clock of Ctesihius — Hydraulic Organs. 



547 



hours the tube would be filled, and the figure near the top of the column. 
It was then that the siphon came into play. Its short leg, as represented 

in the cut, was connected to the lower part 
of the tube that contained the float, and its 
bend reached as high as the upper end of 
the tube. When the latter therefore was 
full the siphon would be charged, and the 
contents of the tube discharged by it into 
one of the buckets of the wheel. The figure 
with the wand would then descend, having 
nothing to support it. The wheel having 
six buckets only, performed a revolution in 
six days. To its axis was secured a pinion of 
six teeth that worked into a wheel with sixty, 
and on the shaft of this wheel a pinion of 
ten teeth drove a wheel of sixty-one teeth, 
which last wheel by its axis turned the 
column round once in 365 days. 

As the accuracy of such a clock depended 
upon the size of the orifices in the weeping 
figure, whence the water escaped, to pre- 
vent their enlargement by the friction of the 
liquid, Ctesibius bushed them with jewels. 

About the year 807, the Caliph Haroun 
sent some valuable presents to Charlemagne, 
and among them a water-clock, which struck 
the hours by means of twelve little brass 
balls failing on a bell of the same metal. 
There were also twelve figures of soldiers, 
which at the end of each hour opened and 
shut doors according to the number of the 
hour. — (Martigny's Hist. Arabians, iii. 92.) 

There is a very simple clepsydra in Kircher's 
Mundus Subterraneus, torn, i, 157. M. Amon- 
tons devised another. Mem. Acad. Science, 
A. D. 1699, p. 51. See also Phil. Trans, vol. xlv, 
p. 171, and Fludd's Simia. Decaus has given 
a clepsydra in the fifth plate of his Forcible 
Movements. A water pendulum is figured 
in Ozanam's Recreations, p. 388. 
Hour-glasses were formerly placed in coffins and buried with the corpse, 
probably as symbols of mortality — the sands of life having run out. See 
Gent. Mag. vol. xvi, 646, and xvii, 264. Lamps found in ancient sepul- 
chres were possibly interred with the same view — to indicate the lamp 
of life having become extinguished. 

Garcilasso mentions a dial by which the Peruvians ascertained the time 
when the sun entered the equinox : whether these people or the Mexicans 
had water-clocks we have not been able to ascertain. 

Hydraulic Organs do not appear to be of so high antiquity as clepsydras, 
but their origin is equally uncertain. Perhaps they were derived from 
musical water-clocks. 

The first organs were probably nothing more than simple combinations 
of flutes, pipes, and other primitive wind instruments. What the cir- 
cumstances were that led to the idea of uniting a number of these, and 
supplying them with wind from bellows instead of the mouth can hardly be 




No. 272. Clepsydra by Ctesibius. 



548 Variety of Water- Organs. [Book V. 

conjectured. The first step was probably bag-pipes, and the second the 
addition of keys or valves. In process of time, the instruments, instead 
of being made of reeds or other natural tubes, were formed of metal ; and 
their number, variety, and dimensions increased until organs became the 
most powerful and harmonious, and consequently the most esteemed of 
all musical machines. The organs mentioned in the Bible were probably 
portable ones, similar to the modern regal. The ancients divided them 
into two classes — pneumatic and hydraulic, or wind and water organs. 
The difference consisted merely in the modes of supplying the wind — in 
one it was by means of water, while in the other bellows were worked 
by men. 

Water was employed in various ways in ancient hydraulic organs. 

1. By falling through a pipe, it carried down air into a reservoir, as in 
the trombe or shower bellows, (No. 198.) Here it not only furnished 
the air but forced it through the pipes. According to Kircher, it was then 
discharged on a wheel, and gave motion to drums on whose peripheries 
were projecting pins, which depressed the keys of the instrument, as in the 
modern barrel organ. 

2. It was discharged upon an overshot wheel, and by cranks and levers 
merely worked common bellows. This may seem strange to some readers, 
but it must be remembered that these instruments were often of enormous 
dimensions. Even so rude a people as the Anglo-Saxons, had organs 
that required " seventy strong men" to work the bellows. 

3. Sometimes water was only used in an open tank or cistern, into 
which a smaller one constituting the air-chamber was inverted. The air 
was then forced by ordinary or piston bellows into the latter, and dis- 
placing the water caused it to rise in the outer vessel, where its constant 
pressure urged the air through the organ. — See No. 110, and p. 245. 

4. The vapor of boiling water or steam was also used, and which of 
course supplied the place of both wind and bellows. The extent to which 
steam was used is unknown. It was probably confined chiefly to the 
temples. 

The details of the mechanism of ancient organs that have come down 
are very imperfect. Their description by Vitruvius and Heron is obscure, 
and in some parts unintelligible ; and they admit that the construction was 
too complex to be easily comprehended except by those familiar with 
them. 

The earliest distinct notice on record of any thing like a water-organ, 
is the musical clepsydra of Plato. There is no reason to suppose it was 
invented by him, but rather the contrary, for he contemned all mechani- 
cal speculations. He probably met with it in Egypt, and having intro- 
duced it to his countrymen, was (as usual with them) considered its author. 

Tertullian, in a Treatise on the Soul, speaks of an organ invented by 
Archimedes, but of its construction little is known. 

From Vitruvius' account of hydraulic organs, and from the last two 
Problems in Heron's Spiritalia, we learn that they were very elaborate 
machines. Decaus has amplified some of Heron's devices for producing 
music by water. 

Plutarch in comparing Cato and Phocion, after observing that their 
severity of manners was equally tempered with humanity, and their valor 
with caution ; that they had the same solicitude for others, and the same 
disregard for themselves ; the same abhorrence of every thing base and 
dishonorable, &c. observes, that to mark the difference in their charac- 
ters would require a very delicate expression, like the finely discriminated 
sounds of the organ. This is supposed by Langhorne to have been a 



Chap. 8.] Nero's Water- Organ — Others in the Middle Ages. 549 

water-organ. The elder Pliny refers to them in book ix, cap. 8. Speak- 
ing of dolphins, he observes, they are fond of music, especially " the sound 
of the V)ater instrument, or such kind of pipes." We noticed, page 245, 
a representation of an hydraulic organ on a medal of Valentinian. The 
silver Triton, mentioned in the chapter on Fountains, that by machinery 
was made to rise out of the lake and sound a trumpet, may be considered 
a modification of these instruments, and so may the whistling clock of 
Athenaeus mentioned in the last one. 

Suetonius, in his Life of Nero, mentions an hydraulic organ which that 
emperor took particular pleasure in. It must have been a magnificent 
affair, since even Nero deemed it of sufficient importance to form the 
principal object vowed by him, when the empire was in danger from the 
rebellion of Vindex. Inviting some of the chief Romans to a consultation 
on public affairs, " he entertained them the rest of the day with an organ 
of a new kind, and showing them the several parts of the invention, and 
discoursing about the nature and difficulty of the instrument, he told them 
he designed to introduce it upon the theatre, if Vindex would permit him." 
In this passage Suetonius does not state that the machine was a water- 
organ ; but in a subsequent one he observes, — " Towards the close of 
Nero's life, he publicly vowed that if the empire was secured to him (by 
overcoming the rebels) he would bring out at the games, for his obtaining 
the victory, a water-organ, a chorus of flutes and bag-pipes," &c. 

The author of a letter, attributed to St. Jerome, speaks of a large organ at 
Jerusalem, the sounds of which could be heard at the distance of a thousand 
paces, or to the Mount of Olives. It consisted of two elephant skins, or 
rather perhaps resembled two of those animals. There were twelve large 
bellows and fifteen brass pipes. The two animals w r ere said to represent 
the Old and New Testaments — the pipes the patriarchs and prophets, and 
the bellows the twelve apostles. The particulars of its construction are 
not known. 

Organs were used more or less throughout the dark ages, during which 
several were brought into Europe from the East. 

In 757, the Greek emperor Constantine sent two organs to Pepin, king 
of France. Mezeray says, they were the first seen in that country. 
Another was sent from Constantinople to Charlemagne in 812; but nothing 
is known of their construction, except that the last imitated the sounds of 
thunder, the lyre and cymbal. 

In the ninth century, Louis Debonnaire had a water-organ made for his 
palace at Aix-la-Chapelle, by a Venetian priest named George. Another 
organ, in which water is supposed not to have been employed, he erected 
in one of the churches of that city, and its sounds are said to have been so 
ravishing, that a woman died in ecstacy under their influence. — (See Pre- 
face to L'Art du Facteur D'Orgues ; Arts et Metieres, folio edit. 1778.) 

At page 401, we mentioned an organ made by Gerbert, in which steam 
was employed instead of air. 

We find, says Fosbroke, organs with pipes of box-wood, of gold, and 
organs of alabaster and glass ; and some played on with warm water. 
Brass pipes and bellows are mentioned by William of Malmsbury. " The 
monks of Italy, of the orders devoted to manual labor, applied themselves 
to the fabrication of organs ; and in the tenth century, a maker was sent 
into France, whence they insensibly spread over all the western churches. ' v 

Of modern hydraulic organs it is unnecessary to enlarge. Several have 
been noticed in the chapter on Fountains. They have become nearly 
extinct. See Kircher's Musurgia Universalis, Fludd's Simia, Decaus* 
Forcible Movements j Misson, Blainville, Breval, and Keysler's Travels. 



550 Lead — Its Ancient Uses. [Book V. 

The old Regal, a diminutive species of organ, still used in some parts 
of Europe, was sometimes acted on by water ; at least so it would seem 
from a remark of Lord Bacon in his Sylva. Speaking of music, he par- 
ticularizes the tones from the percussion of metals, as in bells — of air, as 
in the voice while singing, in whistles, organs, and stringed instruments — 
" and of water ',, as in the nightingale pipes of regalls, or organs, and other 
hydraulics, which the ancients had, and Nero did so much esteeme, but 
are now lost." — Cent, ii, 102. 



CHAPTER IX. 

Sheet Lead : Lead early known— Roman pig lead — Ancient uses of lead — Leaden and iron coffins 

Casting sheet lead — Solder— Leaden books — Roofs covered with lead — Invention of rolled lead — Lead 
sheathing. Leaden Pipes: Of great antiquity — Made from sheet lead by the Romans — Ordinance of 
Justinian — Leaden pipes in Spain in the ninth century — Damascus — Leather pipes — Modern iron pipes 
— Invention of cast leaden pipes— Another plan in France— Joints united without solder — Invention of 
drawn leaden pipes — Burr's mode of making leaden pipes — Antiquity of window lead — Water injured 
bypassing through leaden pipes — Tinned pipes. Valves: Their antiquity and variety — Nuremberg 
engineers. Cocks: Of great variety and materials in ancient times — Horapollo — Cocks attached to the 
laver of brass and the brazen sea — Also to golden and silver cisterns in the temple at Delphi — Found iu 
Japanese baths — Figure of an ancient bronze cock — Superior in its construction to modern ones — Cock 
from a Roman fountain — Numbers found at Pompeii — Silver pipes and cocks in Roman baths — Golden 
and silver pipes and cocks in Peruvian baths — Sliding cocks by the author. Water-Closets . Of 
ancient date — Common in the East. Traps for drains, &c. 

A few subordinate inventions, but such as are of some importance in 
practical hydraulics have been reserved for this chapter, viz : sheet lead, 
pipes, valves and cocks, water-closets and traps. 

Lead was probably worked before any other metal. Its ores abound 
in most countries, and frequently reach to the surface ; they are easily 
reduced ; the metal fuses at a low temperature ; it is soft and exceedingly 
plastic. Lead is mentioned as common at the time of the Exodus. It 
was among the spoils taken by the Israelites from the Midianites, and 
articles made of it were ordered to be melted up. The Phenicians ex- 
ported tin and lead from Britain. Both are enumerated in the graphic 
account of the commerce of Tyre, in the 27th chapter of Ezekiel. The 
Romans worked lead mines in France, Spain and Britain ; Pliny says, 
those in the former countries were deep and the metal procured with 
difficulty; but in Britain it was abundant, and " runneth ebb in the upper- 
most coat of the ground." Several Roman mining tools and pigs of lead 
have been found in England. In 1741, two pigs were dug up in York- 
shire. Their form was similar to that in which the Missouri lead is cast, 
but more than twice the weight. Each weighed 150 lb. and was inscribed 
in raised letters with the name of the reigning emperor, Domitian. — (Phil. 
Trans. Abrid. ix, 420.) 

The uses to which lead was put by the ancients were much the same as 
at present. The fishermen of Egypt sunk their nets with it just as ours 
do. A portion of a net with " sinkers" attached is preserved in the Berlin 
Museum. Leaden statues are ancient. There was one of Mamurius at 
Rome. They probably preceded those of bronze, and perhaps formed 
part of the spoil of the Midianites mentioned above. The Romans had 
leaden coffins ; a device adopted more or less in all ages. Double leaden 






Chap. 9.] Solder — Leaden Roofs — Invention of Rolled Lead. 551 

coffins (observes Fosbroke) occur in the Anglo-Saxon era, not made of 
plain lead, but folded in a very curious and handsome manner. For the 
mode of making coffins and their singular forms, consult L'Art du Plom- 
bier, Arts et Metieres, tome xiii, a Neuchatel, 1781. a 

' The art of casting lead into sheets on beds of sand, as now practised by 
plumbers, is of immense antiquity. The terraces of Nebuchadnezzar's 
hanging gardens were covered with sheets of lead soldered together, to 
retain moisture in the soil. The composition of ancient solder for lead, 
we know from Pliny, was the same as ours. It is uncertain whether the 
art of uniting lead by " burning," that is, by fusing two edges together 
(without solder) was known. Pliny says, " two pieces of lead cannot 
possibly be soldered without tin glass." Either therefore the ancients 
had not the art of " burning" pieces of lead together, or Pliny was not 
aware of it. 

Tablets of lead were anciently used to write on. Job alludes to them. 
Books composed of leaden leaves are figured by Montfaucon. To such 
tablets, we presume, Pliny refers, when he speaks of lead "driven with 
the hammer into thin plates and leaves." — (Nat. Hist, xxxiv, 17.) 

The employment of sheet lead as a covering for roofs ascends to the 
earliest ages in the East. It is still extensively used there. Tavernier, 
in speaking of the mosques at Aleppo, says their domes were covered 
with lead, and so was the roof of the great hall of the Divan at Constanti- 
nople. He mentions an inn or caravansary, the roof of which was covered 
with the same metal. Henry Blount, who traveled in Egypt and Turkey 
in 1634, found the roofs of the mosques and seraglios at Adrianople covered 
with lead. Count Caylus mentions ancient sheet lead half a line thick 
taken from the inner dome of the Pantheon. Gregory of Tours describes 
an old temple of the Gauls, which was extant in the time of the Emperor 
Valerian, and had a leaden roof. (Montfauc. Supp.) Paulinus built a 
church at Catarick, Eng. which was burnt by the Pagans ; he built another 
of wood, which was the mother church of British Christianity, " and en- 
closed the whole building with a covering of lead." The churches and 
castles of Europe in the middle ages were almost uniformly covered with 
this metal. In a statute passed in the fourth year of Edward I. of Eng- 
land, (A. D. 1276,) to ascertain the value of real estate, commissioners 
were appointed to visit " castles, and also other buildings compassed about 
with ditches [to determine] what the walls, buildings, timber, stone, lead, 
and other manner of covering is worth." — (Statutes at large.) 

Leaden seals on woolen cloth were used in Henry IV.'s reign. 

It is uncertain whether the ancients were acquainted with the process 
of forming lead into sheets by passing it between rollers. If they were, 
the art, like many others, became lost, and was not revived till the 17th 
century. A close examination of specimens of ancient sheet lead might 
determine the question. 

Rolling or " milling" of lead was invented by Mr. Thos. Hale, in 1670, 
about which time the first mill was erected at Deptford. The inventor 
met with violent opposition from shipwrights, because the lead, from its 
smooth surface, uniformity of thickness, and low price, began to be gene- 
rally adopted for sheathing vessels, in place of the old wooden and leather 
sheathing. And as it was used also for gutters and roofs of houses, " the- 

a About twenty years ago iron coffins were introduced in England and secured by- 
patent ; but they were not then by any means a new thing under the sun : for the Par- 
sees of India for ages buried their dead in them. " Ces idolatres adorent le feu comme 
une divinite, considerant le bois comme sa viande ; d'ou il vient qu'ils ne mettent pas 
leurs morts dans les cercueils de bois, mais defer. 1 ' — (C. Antiquaire, iii. 846.) 



552 Ancient Leaden Pipes. [Book V 

plumbers were as industrious as the shipwrights to decry the lead;" but 
finding their opposition in a great measure fruitless, " some of them now 
began to cry it up, and have set up engines to mill it themselves." — 
(Collier's Diet. Art. England.) 

A paper in the Phil. Transactions, 1674, erroneously attributes the in- 
vention to Sir Philip Howard and Major Watson. These gentlemen were 
associated with Hale in the patent, and merely contributed their in- 
fluence to introduce the new manufacture, especially to sheathe the pub- 
lic ships. (Abrid. i, 596.) The large ship built by Archimedes was 
sheathed with lead. 

Pipes for the conveyance of water have been made of earthenware, 
stone, wood and leather, but more generally of lead and copper. Leaden 
pipes extend back to the dawn of history. They were more or less com- 
mon in all the celebrated nations of old. In the old cities of Asia, Egypt, 
Greece, Syria, &c. they were employed to convey water wherever the 
pressure was too great to be sustained by those of earthenware. The 
same practice is still followed : thus in Aleppo, both leaden pipes, and 
those of stoneware are used, and in all probability just as they were when 
this city was known to the Greeks as Bercsa, and to the Jews in David's 
time as Zobah. Archimedes used pipes of lead, to distribute water 
by engines in the large ship built for Hiero ; and the same kind were 
doubtless employed in conveying water to the different terraces of the 
famous gardens of Babylon. The great elevation to which the fluid was 
raised would render earthenware or wooden pipes entirely inapplicable. 

We have no information respecting the mode of making leaden pipes 
previous to the Roman era ; but as that people adopted the arts and cus- 
toms of older nations, we may be assured that their tubes, as well as their 
pumps and other engines, were mere copies of those made by the plumbers 
of Babylon and Athens, Egypt and Tyre. All ancient pipes yet dis- 
covered are said to have been made from sheet lead ; viz : strips of suffi- 
cient width folded into tubes and the edges united by solder. We learn 
from Vitruvius that Roman plumbers generally made them in ten feet 
lengths, the thickness of the metal being proportioned to their bore, accord- 
ing to a rule which he gives in book viii y cap. 7. of his Architecture. 
Large quantities of Roman leaden pipes have been found in different parts 
of Europe, varying in their bore from one to twelve inches. Some of 
them are very irregularly formed, their section being rather egg-shaped 
than circular. Montfaucon has engraved several specimens. On large ones 
belonging to the public, the name of the consul under whom they were 
laid was cast upon them. Others that supplied the baths of wealthy indi- 
viduals have the owners' names ; and sometimes the maker's name was 
cast on them. Of small leaden pipes, Frontinus mentions 13,594 of one 
inch bore that drew water from one of the aqueducts. Pompeii was but 
a small provincial town, of which not more than one-third has been ex- 
plored, and yet a great many tons of pipes have been found. The con- 
sumption of lead for pipes must have been enormous in old Rome, not 
only from their great number, but on account of the large dimensions of 
the principal ones. Pliny might well observe, " Lead is much used with 
us for sheets to make conduit pipes." — (xxxiv, cap. 17.) 

An ordinance of Justinian respecting a bagnio erected at Constantinople 
by one of the dignitaries of the empire is extant : " Our imperial will and 
pleasure is, that the leaden pipes conducting the water to the Achillean 
bagnio, contrived by your wisdom, and purchased by your munificence, 
be under the same regulations and management as have been appointed 
'n the like cases ; and that the said pipes shall only supply such bagnios 



Chap. 9.] Cast Leaden Pipes — First Articles of Cast-Iron in England. 563 

and nymphaea as you shall think fit," &c. Constantinople has for ages 
been supplied with water through leaden pipes. The Sou-terazi or water 
towers, are mere contrivances to facilitate the ascent and descent of the 
fluid through pipes. 

Leaden pipes have been uninterruptedly employed in some or other of 
European cities since the fall of the empire. In the middle of the ni^nth 
century water was conveyed by them to supply Cordorva, in Spain, under 
the Caliph Abdulrahman II. who also caused that city to be paved. This 
is the oldest pavement on record in modern cities. Benjamin of Tudela, 
who visited Damascus in the 12th century, says, the river Pharpar (see 
2 Kings, chap, v,) slideth by and watereth the gardens ; " but Abana is 
more familiar and entereth the citie, yea, by helpe of art in conduits [pipes] 
visiteth their private houses." — (Purchas' Pilgrim.) 

The ancient inhabitants of the island Arados ingeniously obtained fresh 
water from the bottom of the sea. They sunk down over the spring a 
large bell of lead, to the upper part of which was attached a pipe of leather 
that conveyed the fluid to the surface. — (Pliny, v, 31.) 

Some of the Roman earthenware pipes were made to screw into each 
other. Old leaden pipes laid, A. D. 1236, to supply London, are men- 
tioned at page 294. Most modern pipes of large bore are now made 
of cast iron. The largest sizes now laying to supply this city, are nine 
feet in length, three feet internal diameter, and weigh from 3500 to 3800 
pounds. 

The first improvement on the ancient mode of making leaden pipes was 
matured in England in 1539. It consisted in casting them complete in 
short lengths, in molds placed in a perpendicular position. After a number 
were cast, they were united to each other in a separate mold, by pouring 
hot metal over the ends until they run together. The device for " burn- 
ing" or melting the ends was exceedingly ingenious, and such pipes are 
still made to some extent in Europe. In the 30th year of Henry VIII. 
(observes Baker in his Chronicles of the Kings of England,) " the manner 
of casting pipes of lead for conveyance of water under ground without 
using of soder, was first invented by Robert Brocke, clerk, one of the 
king's chaplains, a profitable invention ; for by this, two men and a boy 
will do more in one day, then could have been done before by many men 
in many days. Robert Cooper, goldsmith, was the first that made the 
instruments and put this invention in practice." — (Edit, of 1665, p. 317.) 

Five years afterwards, Ralph Hage and Peter Bawde made the first 
articles of cast iron in England. — (Ibid.) 

In the reign of Henry IV. of France, a native of St. Germain, deviseu 
another mode of casting pipes and burning them together. The mold was 
used in a horizontal position, and the metal poured in at one end. When 
a pipe was cast, it was not drawn entirely out of the mold, but one or two 
inches were left near the spout where the metal entered, so that when 
another length was cast, the hot metal running over the end of the pre- 
vious pipe fused it, and both became as one. The tube was then drawn 
nearly out and another one cast and united to it in like manner, and so 
on till any required length was attained. — (See Planche, vii. L'Art du 
Plombier in Arts et Metieres.) 

Sometimes pipes formed of sheet lead have their seams united by 
" burning." A strip of pasteboard is packed against the inside of the 
seam, and the tube (if small) filled with sand ; the edges are then melted 
with a soldering iron, and the deficiency made up with a bar of lead, in 
the same way as when a bar of solder is used. The old mode of burning 
these seams was by pouring hot lead upon them, and generally a projeo 

70 



554 Draim Pipes — Burr's Plan — Window Lead. [Book V. 

tion of metal was left along the seam. The ancient pipes figured by 
Montfaucon have a similar projection. 

The plan of drawing leaden pipes through dies like hollow wire was 
first proposed by M. Dalesme, in the Transactions of the French Academy 
of Sciences, in 1705. It was subsequently brought forward by M. Fayolle 
in 1728; but it was not till 1790 that such pipes were made. In that year, 
Mr. Wilkinson, the celebrated English iron master, took out a patent for 
drawing them, since which period they have become general in England, 
France, and the U. States. — (See Reper. of Arts, 1st series, vol. xvi.) 

In 1820, a singular mode of making leaden pipes was patented in Eng- 
land by Mr. T. Burr. A large and very strong cast iron cylinder, in which 
a metallic piston is made to work, is secured in a vertical position. To 
the underside of the piston a strong iron rod is fixed, its lower end being 
cut into a screw or formed into a rack for the convenience of forcing the 
piston up, either by means of a steam engine or any other suitable first 
mover. To the upper side of the piston is secured a polished cylindrical 
rod, rather longer than the cylinder, and of the same diameter as the bore 
of the pipe. The cylinder forms a mold in which the pipe is first cast, 
and this rod is the core. The bottom of the cylinder may be open ; but 
the top is strongly closed, with the exception of a circular and polished 
opening at the centre, of a size equal to the external diameter of the pipe. 
Suppose the piston now drawn down to near the bottom of the cylinder, 
the upper end of the polished rod will stand a little above the circular 
opening, and an annular space will be left between them equal to the 
required thickness of the tube. The cylinder is then to be filled with 
fused lead through an opening at the top, (which is to be stopped up by 
a screw-plug or any other device,) and as soon as the metal begins to 
assume the solid state, the piston is slowly raised ; this necessarily forces 
the lead through the annular space in the form of a tube, which is then 
wound on a reel as fast as formed. 

Various cylinders are employed according to the different sized tubes. 
For half inch pipe, one 18 inches long, six or seven inches internal diame- 
ter, and the sides three or four inches thick would be required. Plates 
with openings of different sizes may be adapted to one cylinder. They 
may be made to slide in recesses cast in the top. 

This mode of forming leaden tubes is the same in principle as that by 
which some of earthenware have been made : the clay being put into a 
square and close trunk, is forced by a piston through an annular space, 
adapted to the thickness and bore of the tubes required. At first sight 
the process appears difficult. It also seems strange that solid lead can 
thus be squeezed through an aperture into the form of a tube ; but it should 
be remembered that this metal is extremely soft when heated to near the 
fusing point ; and that the mode only differs from that of making clay 
pipes in requiring a greater force. Tubes made in this way are in general 
more solid than others. This arises from the large body of metal of which 
they are formed being poured while very hot into the cylinder, so that 
there is little danger of flaws or fissures. These pipes may also be made 
in much greater lengths than by any other plan. A manufactory of them 
has recently been established in Philadelphia. — (See Repertory of Arts, 
for 1820, vol. xli, p. 267.) 

From the quantities of pipes used of old, it appears singular that the 
art of drawing them was not discovered, especially as the Tire-Plomb or 
glazier's vise for drawing " window lead" is of ancient date — a most beau- 
tiful machine, and one far more ingenious and interesting than the draw- 
bench ; one too by which lead is worked at a single operation into very 



Chap. 9.] Tinned Leaden Pipes — Valves. 555 

difficult forms, and such as require the metal of different thickness in the 
same piece. a — (See L'Art du Vitrier, pi. v, Arts et Metieres.) 

It has long been known that water conveyed through leaden pipes be- 
comes more or less impregnated with a poisonous solution of that metal ; 
a fact of which the ancients were fully aware, and which made them very 
scrupulous in using it for purposes of domestic economy. Hippocrates 
and Galen denounced its employment both for cisterns to contain, and 
tubes through which to conduct water. Ancient architects were of the same 
opinion ; thus Vitruvius observes, that water drawn from leaden tubes is 
very pernicious, and adds, " we should not, therefore, conduct water in 
pipes of lead if we would have it wholesome." The Medical Transactions 
of modern times, and works on mineral poisons abound with examples of 
the fatal effects of drinking water from reservoirs and pipes of this metal. 

Several modes have been devised to render leaden pipes innoxious. In 
1804, an English patent was obtained for coating their interior surfaces 
with tin. This was effected in the following manner : — Suppose a work- 
man engaged in making tubes of half an inch bore ; he first pours lead into 
an iron mold and forms a pipe two feet long, an inch thick, and nearly an 
inch in the bore : as soon as the lead poured in becomes solid, he with- 
draws the steel mandril which formed the interior of the tube, throws in 
a little rosin dust, and inserts a half inch mandril, between which and the 
inside of the tube a certain space is left. Into this space he then pours 
melted tin, which as it collects below, causes the rosin to float on its sur- 
face, as it rises to the top, and lubricates the hot sides of the leaden tube. 
Both metals thus become united, and when the tin becomes solid the man- 
dril is taken out ; and the tube, thus plated with tin, is passed to the draw- 
bench, and drawn out to the required length like an ordinary leaden tube. 
There is some difficulty in making the tin unite uniformly to the lead, and 
w r hen this does not take place the pipes are apt to be broken in drawing ; 
for as the two metals do not stretch equally, the thin lining of tin is pulled 
apart ; and if the lead does not separate at the same place, its surface is 
exposed, and the strength of the tube greatly diminished at such places. — 
(Repertory of Arts, 2d series, vol. v.) 

In 1820 another English patent was issued for a similar plan, the dif- 
ference consisting chiefly in a mode of better securing the union of the tin 
with the lead. — Ibid. vol. xxxviii. 

In 1832, the author of this volume took out a patent for coating leaden 
pipes with tin, by passing them, after being drawn and otherwise finished, 
through a bath of the fluid metal. As there is a difference in the fusing 
points of tin and lead of about 200° Fahrenheit, there is no difficulty in the 
process. By this plan tubes are effectually tinned both inside and out, and 
any imperfections or fissures are soldered up. The operation is exceed- 
ingly simple and the expense trifling. The process is patented in England, 
where the tubes are, we believe, more extensively used than in this coum 
try. — (See Journal of the Franklin Institute for November, 1832, and 
May, 1835.) 

Valves and Cocks are too essential to hydraulic engines to be omitted 
in this work. The principle of the valve has always been in use for a 
variety of purposes. Doors are valves, and were so named by the ancients. 
Those of the private apartments of Juno were contrived by Vulcan to close 
of themselves. Thus Homer sings : 

a In one of the apartments of a villa at Pompeii, there was a large glazed bow-win 
dow. The glass was thick, tinged with green, and " set in leadlike a modern casement." 
—(See Encyc. Antiq. pp. 57, 398 ) 



556 Clacks — Tubular Valves — Nuremburg Engineers. [Book V. 

Touched with the secret key, the doors unfold ; 

Self-closed behind her shut the valves of gold. a Iliad, xiv. 

It is probable that all valves were originally in the form of doors ; that 
is, mere flaps or clacks moving on a hinge, and either laying horizontally 
like a trap-door, inclined like some of our cellar doors, opening vertically 
as an ordinary door, or suspended by hinges from the upper edge ; and 
sometimes they consisted of two leaves like folding doors. Examples of 
all these are still common. Isis was represented by the ancient Egyptians 
with " the key of the sluices of the Nile" in her hand ; the instrument by 
which the doors or valves, like the locks in our canals were opened and 
closed. 

The most ancient musical wind instruments known in the Eastern world 
are provided w*th valves, as the primitive bag-pipes, and the Chinese 
variation of this instrument, which Toreen describes as consisting of " a 
hemisphere to which thirteen or fourteen pipes are applied, and catching 
the air blown into it by valves." The pastoral flute of Pan, from its 
expressing thirty-two parts, he supposes to have been of a similar con- 
struction. (Osbeck's Voyage, ii, 248.) Valves were of course employed 
in the organs of Jubal, as well as in the bellows belonging to his celebrated 
brother and other antediluvian blacksmiths. The ninth problem of the 
Spiritalia relates to valves. Conical metallic valves were used by Ctesi- 
bius in the construction of clepsydrae. In most of the old representations 
of pumps, flaps of leather, loaded and stiffened with pieces of wood or 
lead are figured. Agricola has given figures of no other. These clacks, 
as they are named, are in most cases preferable to the most perfect spheri- 
cal or conical valves of metal : the smallest particle of sand adhering to these 
makes them leak ; besides which, they are liable to stick. We have known 
them replaced with common clacks. Amontons, in experimenting with 
a forcing pump, found the valves, which were of highly polished metal 
and well fitted, adhere so strongly to their seats, that he had to substitute 
leather clacks for them. 

The spindle valve, or such as have a long shank to prevent their rising 
too high, and guiding them when descending, is said to be of French 
origin. 

We have sometimes used a simple valve on the lower box of a pump. 
It consisted of a short pipe of thin and very soft leather secured to the 
upper side of the box. When the sucker was raised, the water rushed 
through this pipe, and when the stroke ceased, it was instantly collapsed 
by the pressure of the fluid above it, and then fell down on one side of 
the box. 

Cocks are a species of valve, but not self-acting like the latter. In 
pumps and bellows the momentum of the entering fluids opens the valves, 

a Doors opened and closed by secret machinery were formerly much in vogue. Heron 
made those of a temple thus to act. Vitruvius speaks of doors that closed by themselves, 
(and when opened, rose sufficiently high to clear the carpet.) In the old cities of Eu- 
rope, the gates were moved by concealed mechanism to prevent a surprise. Those at 
Augsburg were famous. A single person only could enter at a time, and he was inclosed 
between two gales till the object of his visit was ascertained. As soon as he approached 
the first one, it opened of itself, he entered, " and it closed upon his heels." On reach- 
ing the second it acted in like manner. During these operations, the visitor saw no 
person, although he was exposed to the scrutiny of officers within. The magistrates of 
Nuremburg, desiring to have a gate of the same kind for the security of their city, sent 
some engineers to take a model ; but after several examinations, they returned home 
and reported "that without pulling down the walls, and all the masonry, it was not in 
the power of Beelzebub himself to find out how it was contrived, or to make one like it 
in a thousand years." — (Blainville's Travels, i, 250.) 



Chap. 9.] Bronze Cocks of great Antiquity \ 557 

while their own weight serves to close them ; but in ordinary cocks, the 
plugs must be turned by some external force. Cocks of wood, brass, and 
other metals, and made on the principle of those now in use are extremely 
ancient. There is reason to believe that ancient modifications both of valve 
and plug cocks were quite as numerous as modern ones. It is certain 
that the Greeks, Romans (and most probably the Babylonians and Egyp- 
tians also) had far richer specimens of these instruments, both as regards 
the material and workmanship than any thing of the kind in modern days. 

Horus Apollo, or Horapollo, an Egyptian of the fourth century, wrote 
a work " Concerning the Hieroglyphics of the Egyptians," and he informs 
us that the priests gave the form of a lion to " the mouths and stops [cocks] 
of consecrated fountains," because the inundation of the Nile occurred 
when the sun was in Leo. — (Encyc. Anti. i, 185, note.) 

The contents of those enormous metallic vases mentioned in both sacred 
and profane history, were undoubtedly discharged through cocks, although 
these are not always indicated : as the laver of brass made by Bezaleel 
out of the mirrors of the Israelitish women : the brazen sea also, which 
was cast by a Tyrian brass-founder for Solomon. This unrivaled vase 
was, according to Josephus, of an hemispherical form. It was sixteen 
feet in diameter and between eight and nine in depth ; " an hand-breadth" 
in thickness, and contained about 15,000 gallons. The brim was wrought 
like the brim of a cup, with flowers of lilies ; " and under the brim of it 
round about, there were knops cast in two rows when it was cast." It 
was supported on a pedestal which rested on twelve brazen statues of 
oxen, from whose mouth the liquid is supposed to have been drawn. 
This splendid vessel was removed from off the statues by Ahaz — " he 
took down the sea from off the brazen oxen that were under it, and put it 
upon a pavement of stones." It was subsequently carried to Babylon by 
Nebuchadnezzar. 

When Sylla pillaged the temple of Delphi, he found a vase of silver so 
large and heavy that no ordinary carriage could support it. He therefore 
had it cut up. (Plutarch in Sylla.) Herodotus, i, 51, in enumerating the 
gifts of Croesus to the same temple, mentions a cistern of gold, and one 
of silver of immense dimensions, (perhaps the same taken by Sylla,) also 
silver casks and basins — that these had cocks is certain, for he observes 
that a statue of a boy was attached to one of them, and the water was 
discharged through one of his hands. This shows how variegated were the 
figures and orifices of ancient cocks. The Japanese indulge a similar taste, 
and have doubtless inherited it from their remote progenitors. Some 
of their bronze idols are made to serve as fountains, and the water issues 
from the fingers of some, while others hold a vase from which it flows, as 
in the Greek and Roman designs of Oceanus and Neptune. The Dutch 
on first visiting the Japanese found the baths of these people supplied 
with cold and warm water by means of pipes " and copper cocks." — 
(Montanus' Japan, translated by Ogilby, pp. 94, 279, 449, and Thunberg's 
Travels, iii, 102.) 

Bronze or brass cocks were as common in old Rome and probably other 
ancient cities, as they are in any modern one. The immense number of 
pipes that conveyed water to the houses, baths, fountains, &c. must have 
kept a great number of founders constantly at work in making and re- 
pairing them. We learn from Vitruvius that every main pipe that passed 
through the streets, had a large cock, by which the water was let in or 
excluded, and that these cocks were turned as similar ones now are, with 
an iron key. Several specimens of ancient cocks are extant. Among 
these, a very large one discovered in the ruins of a temple built by 




558 Ancient Bronze Cocks — Silver Pipes and Cocks. [Book V. 

Tiberius at Capri, and preserved in the Museum at Naples, is not the 
least interesting. No. 273 is a figure of it. The plug has become by 

time immoveable, and having been shut 
when last used, the water within it is 
still confined. This is made evident, 
for when two men raise the cock, the 
splashing sound of the fluid is distinctly 
heard. 

This cock was found attached to a 
reservoir, but in what manner it was con- 
nected we know not — by solder ] screws 1 
— particulars that cannot be determined 
No. 273. Ancient bronze cock. by the sketch. Had we an opportunity 

of examining it we would endeavor to 
ascertain its weight, dimensions, &c. — whether the substance of the plug and 
chamber are the same, and if the former is secured in the latter by slightly 
riveting its lower edge, as in our small cocks, or by a washer and screw 
as in large ones. 

The mode of forming the handle, or that part by which the plug is 
turned, in a separate piece from the latter, is decidedly superior to the 
common practice of casting both in one piece. It is a common occurrence 
to throw aside a cock and replace it with a new one, simply because this 
part has been broken from the plug, and can only be remedied by replacing 
the latter with it. Now this would never occur if cocks were made like 
this ancient one, for the part alluded to might be renewed with the same 
facility as the key of a door or the handle of a hammer. The mode of 
attaching this part to the plug by sliding it between two dove-tailed grooves, 
is ingenious, simple, and very effective. 

In a great portion of modern cocks the area of the opening through the 
plug seldom exceeds one half of that through the chamber ; but in the 
above one, the chamber is sufficiently large to allow a uniform passage- 
way throughout. 

The modern name of these instruments is supposed to have arisen from 
their having been made in the form of the male of the domestic fowl ; 
hence weather-cock, the cock of a gun, &c. 

The luxury of the Romans under the empire led them to monstrous 
excesses, particularly with regard to baths ; the water to supply which 
was often conveyed through pipes of pure silver, and of course through 
cocks of the sam,e. Seneca, in a letter to Lucilius, describing the humble 
villa of the great Scipio, deplores this degeneracy of his countrymen. " I 
write to you [he says] from the villa of Scipio Africanus, where I at present 
am, and have worshipped his manes and his altars ... I surveyed this villa, 
which is built with square stone and surrounded with a wall. I viewed 
the grooves and towers planted and erected on each side : a capacious 
cistern and basin for water is below the house and gardens, large enough 
to supply a whole army ; next a small bath, and that something dusky. 
It was a sensible pleasure to compare the manners of Scipio with ours. 
In this little hole, this corner, did that terror of Carthage, to whom alone 
Rome owed her not being taken a second time, wash and refresh himself, 
after being tired with his country toils ; for he used the country exercises 
and ploughed his ground himself, as the ancients were wont to do. Be- 
neath this humble roof he stood, and this plain unartful floor supported 
him. Who now, in our days, would endure so mean a bath 1 Every man 
now thinks himself poor if the walls of his bath shine not with large orbs 
of precious stones — unless the Alexandrian marble be embossed, crusted 



Chap. 9.] 



Roman Baths — Ancient Roman Cock. 



559 



over and varied with Numidian borderings — unless they are covered with 
Mosaic — if the vaulted roof be not of glass — unless the Thusian stone, 
formerly so rare and only to be found in some particular temple or public 
building, line the cistern, into which he descends after sweating, without 
soiil or life, if the water pours not on him from silver conduits. I speak 
now only of the pipes and baths of the vulgar ; but what shall I say when 
I come to those of the freed-men 1 How many statues ! How many rows 
of pillars supporting no weight, but placed there merely for the sake of 
expense and ornament !" &c. &c. 

No. 274 is another ancient cock 
from the third volume of Montfau- 
con's Antiquities. It will serve as 
a specimen of the richness and va- 
riety of ornament with which these 
instruments were sometimes deco- 
rated. The figure standing on the 
head of a dolphin, and which form- 
ed the handle by which the cock 
was opened and closed, is supposed 
to have represented the Genius of 
the garden, in which the fountain 
was placed. Another highly orna- 
mented cock, or rather part of one, 
is also engraved in the same work; 
but as it appears to be merely that 
part by which the plug was turned, 
it is omitted. There are several 
bronze jet pipes for fountains ex- 
tant, and in great variety of shapes. 
They were sometimes plated with 
gold, as appears from traces of it 
left on some of them. 

Much additional information re- 
specting the use of cocks among the 
Romans has been obtained from the ruins of Herculaneum and Pompeii. 
Several have been found in the houses and baths. Some were attached to 
pipes, fountains, and to boilers on large moveable tripods, or braziers, and 
also to urns or vases, similar to our tea and coffee urns. Most of them 
are ornamented with lions' heads, &c. In one brazier, the cock is quite 
plain, and resembles those which are known to plumbers as stop-cocks. 
In some of the braziers, the grate bars are hollow, that the water might 
circulate through them, and the cocks are inserted just above the bottom 
of the boilers, that a little water might always be retained to prevent the 
fire from destroying them. 

In the baths of Claudius the water ran through pipes of silver. At La- 
nuvium, in the ruins of a villa of Antoninus Pius, a silver cock was found 
which served for a fountain. It weighed thirty-five Roman pounds, and 
was inscribed " Faustinas Nostras." — (Encyc. Antiq. vol. i, 456.) I was 
shown, says Breval, in his " Remarks on Europe," several curious frag- 
ments that had been dug out of the gardens of Maecenas. Among these, 
were some huge leaden pipes that conveyed the water from the Claudian 
aqueducts into a subterraneous bathing-room. The magnificence of the 
place must have been suitable, no doubt, to the immense wealth and deli- 
cacy of a Roman of his rank ; especially, if what I was assured was the 




No. 274. Ancient Roman cock. 



560 Silver Pipes — Peruvian Baths — Sliding Cocks. [Book V. 

fact, that some lesser tubes discovered among the same rubbish were of 
solid silver. 

Nothing, says Blainville, could equal in richness the apartments of Ca- 
racalla's baths. Columns, statues, rarest marbles and jaspers, and pictures 
of an immense value were lavished on every one of them. The very pipes, 
both large and small, which conveyed water into the bathing apartments, 
were all of the jinest silver. This particular is recorded by several [ancient] 
authors, and among others by Statius. 

Otho, in a feast given to Nero, almost deluged his guests with a most 
precious liquid perfume, which, " by opening certain cocks" gushed out 
of silver and golden tubes that were placed in different parts of the room. 

As water was conveyed by pipes into the houses and temples of ancient 
Mexican and Peruvian cities, it might thence be concluded, in the absence 
of direct testimony, that cocks, at least wooden spigots, were in use also ; 
but there is evidence of the fact. We are informed, that in a palace of 
Atabalipa, there was a bath or " golden cisterne, whereto were by two 
pipes fr8m contrary passages, brought both cold water and hot, to use 
them mingled or asunder at pleasure." (Purchas' Pilgrim, 1073.) Now 
that these pipes were furnished with cocks, is expressly asserted by Gar- 
cilasso, in a passage we have already quoted. (See page 170.) Cisterns 
and pipes, both of silver and gold were used in the temple at Cusco. 

" Golden pipes" are mentioned by the prophet Zechariah, iv, 2 and 12. 

We gave a figure of a siphon cock at Nos. 265-6, and shall here describe 
a sliding one, contrived and used by us several years ago. A, No. 275 re- 
presents a short brass or copper tube, with a stuffing-box fitted to its upper 
end : the lower end is soldered to a pipe proceeding from a reservoir, 
or from a main in the street. B a smooth and smaller tube, having its 
lower end closed, works through the stuffing-box : to its upper end, 
which is also closed, a knob or handle is fixed, and just below, there is a 
spout for discharging the water. At the middle of B, a number of holes 
are drilled through its sides, or they may be in the form of slits. Now 
while these openings are kept above the stuffing-box (as shown in the 
cut) no water can be discharged ; but as soon as B is pushed down, so as 
to bring them below the stuffing-box, the fluid rushes through them and 
escapes at the spout. To stop the discharge B is then raised, as in the 
figure. There should be one or two small projecting pieces near the lower 
end of B to prevent its being pulled entirely out of A. The pressure of 
the water tends to keep B from sliding down, when the instrument is not 
in use, even if the friction of the stuffing-box were not sufficient. The 
external edges of the slits should be smooth to prevent them from catch- 
ing hold of the packing while passing through it. Of this, there is however 
but little danger in small cocks, and in those of larger size, that part of B 
through which they are made might be slightly contracted. 

No. 276 represents one of these cocks attached to a cistern, with the 
openings within the stuffing-box, and consequently the fluid escaping. 
The length of the slits should always be less than the depth of the packing. 

No. 277 exhibits a stop-cock, or one whose ends are straight and alike, 
(such as plumbers solder in the middle of pipes.) A straight tube C D 
is closed by a partition or disk in the middle of its length : as the water 
which flows from the reservoir always remains in the end C, the object is 
to open a communication for it to pass into D. To accomplish this, slits 
or other shaped openings are made through the pipe on both sides of the 
disk, and a shorter but wider tube E, with a stuffing-box at each end is 
fitted to slide over C D. Thus, to allow water to pass into D, all that is 
required is to move E (by the two projecting handles) till both series of 



Chap. 9.] 



Sliding Cocks — Water- Closets. 



561 



openings are inclosed by it ; while to stop the flow through D, E must 
be moved back towards C as in the figure. The upper figure in the cut 
is another form of the same thing. The sliding tube H is the smallest, 
and has one end closed like Nos. 275 and 276, while F and G are sepa- 
rate ' pieces. Its action will be sufficiently obvious from the preceding 
remarks. 




No. 275. 



No. 276. 



No. 277. 



Large cocks on this principle may be made for half the cost of ordinary 
ones, while the expense of keeping them in order is too trifling to be 
noticed — occasionally to renew the packing is all that could be required. 

Water- Closets have been greatly improved by modern artists, but they 
are an ancient and probably Asiatic device. The summer chamber of 
Eglon, king of Moab, (Judges, iii, 20-25) is supposed to have been one. 
They were introduced into Rome during the republic, and are noticed by 
several ancient writers. Those constructed in the palace of the Caesars 
were adorned with marbles, arabesque and mosaics. At the back of one 
still extant, there is a cistern, the water of which is distributed by cocks 
to different seats. The pipe and basin of another has been discovered 
near the theatre at Pompeii, where it still remains. Heliogabalus con- 
cealed himself in one, and whence he was dragged by his soldiers and 
slain. 

Water-closets seem to have been always used in the East, and for rea- 
sons which Tavernier and other oriental travelers have assigned. Numbers 
are erected near the mosques and temples. A similar custom prevailed in 
old Rome, Constantinople, Smyrna, and probably all ancient cities. In 
the city of Fez, " round about the mosques, are 150 common houses of 
ease, each furnished with a cock and marble cistern, which scoureth and 
keepeth all neat and clean, as if these places were intended for some 
sweeter employment." — (Ogilby's Africa, 1670, p. 88.) In his " Relation 
of the Seraglio," Tavernier describes a gallery, in which were several 
water-closets. "Every seat [he observes] has a little cock." He mentions 
others, in which the openings were covered by a plate, which by means 
of a spring " turned one way or the other at the falling of the least weight 
upon it." 

Sir John Harrington is said to have introduced water-closets into Eng- 
land in Elizabeth's reign, and some writers have erroneously ascribed 
their invention to him. They are described in the great French work on 
Arts and Manufactures, by M. Roubo, who says, they were long used in 

71 



562 



Traps for Drains, fyc. 



[Book V. 



France before being known in England. Those which he has figured are 
however on the ancient plan, without traps, and such are still to be found 
in oriental cities. They are not to be compared with the modern ones. 
(See L'Art du Menuisier, folio edit. 1770, PL 69 ; Gell's Pompeiana; A 
Dissertation on Places of Retirement, Lond. 1751 ; Fryer's Travels in 
India and Persia, Lond. 1698.) 

Devices for preventing the ascent of offensive vapors from sinks, sewers, 
drains, &c. are named traps. As these are simple in construction, and 
applicable under all circumstances, and yet are little known, we have 
inserted a sketch of a few of the most common. They are all modifica- 
tions of the same principle. 




No. 278. 



No. 279. 



No. 280. 



No. 281. 



A A represent a floor or covering of a sink or sewer, and the object is 
to discharge refuse water or slops of any kind into the latter without 
allowing currents of air to rise through the passage. No. 278 is a leaden 
pipe bent at one part into the form of a letter S, which part constitutes 
the trap. One extremity enters ,the sink, and to the other, which is turned 
up perpendicularly, the basin of a water-closet, or a common funnel is 
attached. The flexures of the tube must be such, that whatever liquid is 
thrown down the basin, a portion will always remain in the bent part 
below so as to seal the passage completely, as shown in the cut. The basin 
and trap may be placed in a room at any distance above the sink or sewer, 
provided both are connected by an air-tight tube. 

No. 279 is named a D trap, from its resemblance to that letter. It is 
of the kind generally used in water-closets, for which purpose it is always 
made of lead, and about twelve inches long, five wide, and ten or eleven 
deep. The pipe that enters the sink is soldered to one end and near the 
top. The other one to which the basin is attached descends six or seven 
inches through the top at the opposite extremity of the trap. By this 
arrangement water is retained within to a level with the lower edge of the 
pipe that enters the sink, while the perpendicular pipe dips between one 
and two inches below the surface. Hence although impure air in the sink 
can readily ascend into the trap, it cannot enter the tube on which the 
basin is placed ; for to do so, it would have to descend through two inches 
of the water to reach the orifice of the tube ; and then to ascend through 
an equal column within the latter before it could rise into the basin. 

No. 280 is a form of trap used over the openings of street sewers, for 
which purpose they are commonly constructed of stone or brick and lined 
with cement. The figure is that of a square box open at top. A pipe is 
inserted through the bottom at one side to connect it with the sewer. This 
pipe stands about half way up the inside of the box, and above it there is 
a bent rectangular partition attached at three of its sides to the box, while 
the fourth side extends into the middle and dips two inches below the 



Chap. 9.] Bell Traps— Water-Lute. 563 

orifice of the pipe, and consequently that depth in water , thus cutting off 
all external communication with the air in the sewer. A loose grate fits 
into a recess on the edge of the box, and is occasionally removed to take 
gut the dirt that passes the grate. Small traps of the kind, and made of 
cast iron, are sometimes used in the drains of private houses. 

No. 281 is named a bell trap from its figure. Such are generally of 
small dimensions, and are mostly used in kitchens, over the channels or 
tubes through which refuse fluids are discharged into sinks or drains. The 
end of the pipe projects two or three inches into the trap, consequently a 
quantity of water must always remain within at the same elevation. Over 
the pipe a bell or inverted cup dips about half an inch into the water, and 
is of such a size as to leave sufficient room for the fluid to descend between 
it and the sides of the trap, and also to pass under its edge and rise into 
the pipe, and so escape into the drain. The cup or bell is connected to a 
brass grate that drops into a recess cast round the inner edge of the trap. 

The origin of traps is, we believe, unknown. The principle is precisely 
the same as in the water-lute of old chemists. Glauber used contrivances 
identical with Nos. 278 and 281, instead of cocks to close retorts, &c. In- 
stead of water he sometimes used mercury, when the contents were of a 
corrosive nature. 



END OF THE FIFTH BOOK. 



APPENDIX. 



John Bate— Phocion — Well worship— Wells with stairs — Tourne-broche — Raising water by a screw- 
Perpetual motions — Chain pumps in ships— Sprinkling pots — Old frictionless pump— Water power- 
Vulcan's trip-hammers — Eolipiles — Blow-pipe — Philosophical bellows — Charging eolipiles — Eolipillc 
idols referred to in the Bible— Palladium— Laban's images — Expansive force of steam — Steam and air — 
Wind-mills — Imprisoning chairs. 

Some facts and observations having occurred to us during the progress 
of this work which could not be inserted in their proper places, a few are 
added by way of appendix. While engaged on the last chapter, a large 
collection of old books was imported into this city from Europe, in which 
we fortunately found a perfect copy of " Nature and Art," mentioned 
at pp. 321, 421. From the title, which is annexed, it will be seen that 
our conjectures respecting its author and date of publication were correct. 
" The Mysteries of Nature and Art in foure severall parts. The first of 
water-works : the second of fire-works : the third of drawing, washing, 
limning, painting and engraving : the fourth of sundry experiments. The 
second edition, with many additions unto every part. By John Bate, 
Lond. 1635." 

At page 19, we quoted an example of frugality in Dentatus cooking his 
simple food while he swayed the destinies of Rome. There is a parallel 
case in one of the most virtuous of the Greeks, viz. Phocion. Alexander 
esteemed him, but could never induce him to accept of gifts, although he 
was always poor. At one time the Macedonian warrior sent him out of 
Asia a hundred talents as a mark of his regard ; but when the envoys 
arrived with the treasure at Athens, Phocion was inflexible — he would 
not touch it. They then followed him to his house, and were astonished 
beyond measure to find the wife of this truly great man making bread, and 
himself drawing tuater. 

Worship of Wells, pp. 33-37. " The worship of this well of St. Edward 
was particularly forbid by Oliver Sutton, bishop of Lincoln, in the time 
of Edward I. This well worship is strictly forbidden in King Edgar's 
canons, and K. Cnute's laws, as 'twas in a council at London under 
Archbishop Anselm, in the year 1102 ; and some of our best criticks 
observe that what is translated wz'ZZ-worship in Colossians, ii, 23, should 
be well- worship." — Hearne's Preface to Robert of Gloucester's Chronicle.) 

Wells toith Stairs, p. 53. An extraordinary well of this kind was built 
by Pope Clement VII. in 1528. — (See Lond. Mechanics' Mag. vol. ii, 208.) 

Tourne-broche, p. 75. In the 33d year of Henry VI. A. D. 1454, an 
ordinance was established for reducing the expenses of the king's house- 
hold. Instead of a larger number, only " vj children of ye kechyn tourne- 
broches" were appointed, i. e. to turn the spits. — (Proceedings and Ordi- 
nances of the Privy Council of England, edited by Nichols, vol. vi, 229.) 



$66 APPENDIX. 

Raising Water through a Screw, p. 140. Some persons deceived by 
the apparent facility of working a water screw, especially when its jour- 
nals are delicately fitted to their bearings and they turn with little friction, 
imagine that it not only elevates the liquid with a less expense of force 
than any other machine, but with less than is due to the quantity raised ; 
hence it has often been adopted in projects for the perpetual motion. When 
arranged so as to be turned by an overshot wheel, it constitutes one half of 
the first attempts at a solution of that impossible problem, under the im- 
pression that it would raise and discharge upon the wheel all the water 
expended in moving it ! The inclined position of a water-screw is sup- 
posed to contribute to this imaginary result, for, say these reasoners, the 
water then arrives at the top by naturally flowing along each convolution, 
while the force consumed is little if any more than would be required to 
turn the tube if empty ! — the fluid being thus raised in a different manner 
and with much less force, than when lifted directly and perpendicularly 
by the piston of an atmospheric pump, or driven up by that of a forcing 
one ! 

In these projects, the action of the wheel depends of course as much 
upon the screw, as that of the latter does upon the wheel ; in other words, 
each is designed to turn the other : but the very idea of two machines 
reciprocally moving each other at the same time is palpably absurd. The 
two forces will either be equal or unequal. If they are alike both would 
be in equilibrio, and the machines would remain at rest ; and if at any 
time one force exceeded the other, the same result would necessarily take 
place, for the smaller could not then overcome the greater. If the wheel 
could transmit its entire force to the screw, (undiminished by resistance 
from the air, the friction of its bearings and that of the intermediate me- 
chanism,) it would still be impossible for the latter to return it, because to 
do so a greater force than that derived from the wheel would be required ; 
a machine cannot be moved and at the same time move its mover. 
When moved, its force is less than that by which it is moved ; and if it 
becomes the mover, its force must exceed that of the machine to which it 
imparts motion. 

The effect of any machinery composed of levers, cranks, wheels, &c. 
and moved by water, animals, or men, can never exceed the power that 
moves it, for there is nothing in wood, iron and brass, or in any combina- 
tion of them, by which they can create force, or, what is the same thing, 
give out more than is imparted to them. As well might we expect to see 
a carriage returning of itself from a long journey, and laden with the horses 
that drew it from home. 

Wilkins has given a chapter in his Mathematical Magic on " composing 
a perpetual motion by fluid weights." His prominent plan was raising 
water by a screw, and discharging it on float boards attached to the screw 
itself. He quotes older authors who indulged the same whim. Visions 
of great mechanical discoveries often burst upon the ingenious prelate, as 
well as on lay inventors : in such seasons he was in. ecstacies. When he 
first thought of obtaining power by means of a water-screw, he says, " I 
could scarce forbear with Archimedes to cry out, Eureka ! Eureka ! it 
seeming so infallible a way for the effecting of a perpetual motion, that 
nothing could be so much as probably objected against it : but upon trial 
and experience I find it altogether insufficient for any such purpose." 

In the Gentleman's Magazine for 1747, p. 459, there is a description 
and figure of a similar device — either water or balls were to be raised 
through a screw and dropped upon an overshot wheel. It was devised 
by a Col. Kranach, of Hamburgh, who, in a pamphlet, declared he. lw 



APPENDIX. 



567 



spent thirty years in perfecting it. He proposed it as a substitute for wind 
and water-mills, and particularly for raising water and ore from mines, 
In the same work for 1751, p. 448, there is " a self-moving wheel." And 
at p. 391, " a self-moving machine ;" the latter by a Polish Jesuit; it con- 
sisted of a wheel, ropes, pulleys, a pump, weights, &c. and of course, like 
Kranach's, could no more move of itself than a lamp-post, nor increase 
any force imparted to it than could a collection of paving stones. 

If a perpetual motion could be obtained by a water-wheel and screw 
as above, then it would follow that a bricklayer's laborer could convey a 
hod of mortar or a bucket of water to the top of a building with a much 
less expenditure"©? force by traveling along a circular stair-way, than by 
ascending directly up a ladder, and whether he carried the load on his 
shoulder or dragged it after him by a cord. But the fact is, a 100 lb. of 
water cannot by any contrivance whatever be conveyed to the top of a 
building with a force less than would be required to pull up the same 
weight of stone or mortar in a bucket : it can no more be wheedled out 
of its gravity by passing it up an inclined plane than a vertical one — 
through a helical tube than through a straight one. 

Chain-Pumps in Skips, p. 154. John Bate, describing a chain-pump in 
1633, says, a short brass chamber smoothly bored was inserted in the 
lower end. The pistons were fitted to this, and the rest of the pipe was 
of larger bore. The chain was of iron and carried round by a sprocket 
wheel. Each piston consisted of a disk of horn between two of leather. 
Such a pump, he observes, " goeth very strongly, and therefore had need 
be made with wheels and wrought by horses, for so the water is brought 
up at Broken Wharfe in London." He names the chain-pump " an engin 
whereby you may draw water out of a deep well, or mount any river 
water Also it is used in great ships, which I have seen." — (Mys- 
teries of Nature and Art.) 

Atmospheric Sprinkling Pots, p. 194. When Louis, duke of Orleans 
and Milan, brother of Charles VII. was murdered, (A. D. 1407,) his 
widow, as a symbol of her distress and an indication that the rest of her 
life would be spent in tears, adopted the chantepleure or garden pot as an 
heraldic device ; and which, with the motto, plus ne m'est Hens, she had 
engraved upon almost every thing in her house. No. 2S2 is a figure of 
the instrument. (Devises Heroiques, par M. C. Paradin, A Lyon, 1557.) 

No. 283 is another old form 
of the atmospheric sprinkler, 
from a Latin Collection of Em- 
blems of the early part of the 
17th century. The motto on 
a flying scroll was Modo Spi- 
ritus Adsit. Air was admitted 
through a small opening near 
the top, which was closed with 
the point of the finger. 

The sixth and seventh pro- 
blems of Heron's Spiritalia re- 
late to these instruments. The 
two figures there given are hol- 
low spheres ; a small circle 
round the bottom being perforated, and a minute orifice near a ring or 
handle on the top. In one there is a partition, so that two different liquids 
could be contained within ; and wine, or hot and cold water, discharged 
as one or the other of the orifices at the top was uncovered. 




No. 282. 



568 



APPENDIX. 



Fire-Engines and Bellows Pumps, pp. 241, 321. No. 284 is a bellows 
or frictionless pump, from the first edition of Bate's Mysteries of Nature 
and Art. It is identical with the fire engine referred to in our third book, 
except being placed within an open frame instead of a cistern fixed upon 
wheels. For its description, see pp. 321-2. (The leathern bag which 
connected the two brass vessels is not figured by the old artist.) 




No. 284. Old frictionless or bellows pump, A. D. 1633 r 

Water- Wheels, p. 282. There are indications in the Iliad that Vulcan 
used water power, and that it was by the dextrous concealment of it and 
the mechanism by which it was transmitted that enabled him to excite in 
so high a degree the astonishment of his contemporaries, and to give rise 
to those wonderful stories of his skill that are even yet extant. When 
engaged at the anvil Homer represents him, like a modern smith, with a 
single pair of bellows. Thus Thetis found him " sweating at his bellows 
huge ;" but in other scenes, he is exhibited rather as manager of extensive 
forges for the reduction of metals ; the fires being urged by a large num- 
ber of bellows moved either by water or some other inorganic force. Like 
a superintendent of modern iron or copper works, ordering the bellows 
to be thrown into geer, and the blasts increased or diminished as circum- 
stances require : so Vulcan " turning to the fires, he bade the bellows 
heave ;" then 

Full twenty bellows working all at once, 
Breathed on the furnace, blowing easy and free. 

Of Vulcan's numerous works none were more celebrated by the ancients 
than the two androids which assisted him at the anvil. They were obvi- 
ously nothing more than ingenious devices for concealing the mechanism 
by which motion was communicated to the sledges they held in their 
hands : — in other words, mere trip hammers, and worked most likely by a 



APPENDIX. 



569 



distant water- wheel. The rods or levers which communicated the motion 
were probably concealed under the floor, and terminated at the feet of the 
figures, while Vulcan could easily throw them in and out of geer unper- 
ceived. It can readily be imagined what the effect of two well executed 
working images of this kind must have been in early times. 

Eolipiles for Fusing Metals, p. 397. The surprising effects produced in 
modern days by steam and those more important ones which it is destined 
hereafter to accomplish, will always render examples of its early employ- 
ment in the arts interesting. The use of eolipiles as bellows, like that of 
atmospheric sprinklers for watering pots, has long been discontinued, and 
both have almost passed into oblivion. We shall therefore offer no apology 
for inserting the following additional illustrations of the use of the former in 
bygone times. No. 285 is a steam blow-pipe from the 2d edit, of John 
Bate's work. His description forms an admirable comment on Wilkins's 
observation, (p. 396,) that eolipiles were used in melting glass and metals. 
This remark of the bishop has been quoted by several writers, but not 
one has, to our knowledge, endeavored to show how steam was thus 
applied, although every mechanic on perusing Wilkins's book would, like 
ourselves, feel anxious for information on the subject. 




No. 285. Eolipile for glass blowing. 



No. 286. Eolipile for fusing metals. 



The first figure consists of a lamp and a copper ball or eolipile, placed 
on and heated by a furnace or brazier. The apparatus is named " a device 
to bend glasse canes, [tubes,] or to make any small work in glasse." " Let 
there be a vessel of copper about the bignesse of a common foot-ball : let 
it have a long pipe at the top, which must be made so that you may upon 
occasion screw on lesser or bigger vents made for the purpose. Fill this 
one third part with water, and set it over a furnace of coals, as B ; and 
when the water beginneth to heat, there will come a strong breath out of 
the nose of the vessel that will force the flame of a lamp placed at a con- 
venient distance, as A ; if you hold your glasse in the extension of the 
flame, it will melt suddenly ; so you may work what you will thereof." 
Bate observes, that some persons instead of this apparatus used a pipe 
(the common mouth pipe) fastened on a bench between a crotched stick, 
as figured at C. He himself occasionally employed this, but considered 
it not so convenient as the eolipile. — (Mysteries of Nature and Art, Lond. 
1635.) 

In 1650, Dr. John French published " The Art of Distillation, or a 
Treatise on the Choisest Spagyrical Preparations .... with descriptions 
of the chiefest furnaces and vessels used by ancient and modern chemists."' 

12 



570 APPENDIX. 

Of old devices three eolipiles are figured : one is precisely the same as 
above described by Bate. French observes, that it " blows a candle to 
make the flame thereof strong for the melting of glasses and nipping them 
up." No. 286 is another for fusing metals. A large eolipile is perma- 
nently connected to a furnace, the blast being conveyed through a brick 
wall. The following is all that he says respecting it : D " signifies that 
which blows a fire for the melting of any metall or such like operation, 
and it blows most forcibly with a terrible noise." The water was intro- 
duced through an opening at the top. E is a portable eolipile to be held 
in the hand, and the blast applied to fixed objects. It appears from 
French, and also from Ercker's work on Metallurgy, that eolipiles when 
used for blowing fires and fusing metals, were formerly known as The 
Philosophical Bellows, a circumstance that renders their disappearance 
from modern writings still more singular. 

Since the insertion of illustration No. 185, we have met with an Eng- 
lish translation of Ercker's work, by Sir John Pettus, " of the Society of 
the Mines Royal," under Charles II. but who appears to have derived 
little wealth from mining speculations, since he rendered Ercker's book 
into English while confined in prison for debt. The translation is illus- 
trated with fine copperplate engravings, and a dictionary of technical terms 
is subjoined. Under the word bellows, Pettus mentions the " philosophical 
bellows ;" the common smith's bellows, and very large ones that were 
worked by water-wheels, and which, he observes, were made " in imita- 
tion of the nature of a cow beast, which in drawing in and forcing out her 
breath, is said to bellow''' — a quaint definition of bellows, but one which, 
we believe, gives the true etymology of the word. Of the antiquity of 
" philosophical bellows" there can be little doubt. They were probably 
used by the fancy glass-blowers of Egypt, Greece and Rome, as well as 
by other artists in the reduction of metals. The transition from blowing 
ordinary fires with eolipiles to such operations was obvious and easy. 
There is a passage in the book of Joshua which seems to refer to the early 
use of them. In one of the contests of that warrior with the Canaanites, it 
is said he chased them to ** Mizrephoth-maim" — a word signifying " burn- 
ings of waters,'' 1 and "furnaces where metals are melted." A place that 
probably derived its name from extensive forges that were urged by blasts 
from eolipiles. 

Charging Eolipiles by Atmospheric Pressure, pp. 395, 407. Dr. French 
observes, " You must heat them very hot, then put the noses thereof 
(which must have a very small hole in them, no bigger than a pin's head 
may go in) into a vessel of cold water, and they will presently suck in the 
water." Roman eolipiles were charged in the same way, as is clear from 
their description by Vitruvius, for they had but one opening, through which, 
he says, they were filled with water, and out of which the blast issued. 

Eolipilic Fire-Blowers and Idols, pp. 398-400. In addition to those 
passages of Scripture which we have supposed alluded to eolipiles, a few 
others may be named. The sacred writers, it is well known, often con- 
trast the power and other attributes of God with the impotency of idols : 
to adapt their instructions to idolaters, they represent the Almighty as 
excited with anger, wrath, fury, &c. apparently in reference to such 
passions being exhibited (as we know they were) by idols, and particu- 
larly eolipilic idols. Why should God be represented as blasting or 
consuming men with streams of fire from his mouth, and with smoke from 
his nostrils ? kindling coals by his breath ? Why is his anger said to smoke, 
to burn, to wax hot, &c. if it be not in reference to such idols as Pus- 
terich, or those images described by Carpini 1 ? "By the blast of God," savs 



APPENDIX. 571 

Job, " the wicked perish, and by the breath of his nostrils are they con- 
sumed," i. e. as fuel on the hearth is consumed by the blast of an eolipile. 
The Psalmist, describing God, says, " there went up a smoke out of his 
nostrils, and fire out of his mouth ; coals were kindled by it." " Behold 
[says Isaiah] the name of the Lord cometh from far burning with his 
anger, [or the grievousness of flame as the margin has it,] his lips are full 
of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire ; and his breath as an 
overflowing stream shall reach to the midst of the neck." Again, " To- 
phet is ordained of old, yea for the king it is prepared : he hath made it 
deep and large : the pile thereof is fire and much wood, the breath of the 
Lord like a stream of brimstone doth kindle it." 

It appears to us that here and in similar passages are allusions to eoli- 
piles of the human form, and to such images as Pusterich, from whose 
eyes, mouths and nostrils issued streams of flame, smoke, steam, &c. 
Perhaps it will be said the expressions are figurative : true they are so ; 
but then there is in them an allusion to the things from which the figures 
are derived. When God is said to melt his people, to refine, to take away 
the dross from them, every one perceives the allusions to metallurgical 
operations, because such operations are known to all ; and equally clear 
would the passages quoted above appear had eolipilic blowers and idols 
continued in use to our times. We should then have perceived that such 
expressions as the sword of his mouthy swords of fire, faming swords, &c. 
were neither of figurative origin nor application only ; for from the variety 
of eolipilic images, there is little doubt that inflammable fluids were made 
to issue from different parts of them, and in various shapes — from their 
mouths as tongues of fire, and from the hands as flaming swords, &c. We 
know that ancient priests were exceedingly expert in working prodigies 
by inflammable fluids, of which numerous examples might be quoted. 
When Octavius was in Thrace, he consulted the oracle of Bacchus, and 
the ministers of the temple finding it their interest to gratify him, con- 
trived that when the wine was poured on the altar, a body of flame should 
burst out and ascend above the roof of the temple ; a portent, observes Sue- 
tonius, " that had never happened to any but Alexander the Great, when 
he was sacrificing at the same altar." They could, of course, as easily have 
made the flame dart from the mouth and eyes of an idol as from the altar, 
if their views had so required it. 

But if it should be contended that the passages quoted, rather gave rise 
to idols like Pusterich, i. e. were hints which heathen priests worked 
from in order to produce or imitate the same effects, it will not affect the 
inference we wish to draw from them, viz. the antiquity of steam and vapor 
images. In connection with this subject, it may be observed, that the 
famous Palladium of Troy was probably an eolipilic idol, in which inflam- 
mable fluids were used ; for on certain occasions flashes of fire darted 
from its eyes, as from the mouth and forehead of Pusterich. 

If biblical critics would pardon our temerity, we would also suggest 
that the Lares or images which Rachel stole from her father's dwelling 
were, like the small Saxon idol, (p. 398,) and those referred to in Isaiah, 
(p. 400) eolipilic fire blowers. They have exceedingly perplexed com- 
mentators, who after suggesting numerous explanations, generally conclude 
by observing that their nature and uses are unknown ; but had these 
writers called to mind the ancient employment on the domestic hearth 
of brazen eolipiles of the human form, they would have perceived that the 
name of Laban's images gave an indication of what they were. In all 
ancient languages proper names were invariably expressive of some pro- 
minent feature, attribute, or design of the objects named : so of these 



572 APPENDIX. 

images — they were named " teraphim," a word signifying "blowers" from 
tcraph, " to blow." So also the eolipilic idol Pusterich was named from 
pusten, " to blow." (See p. 399.) Eolipiles, like the Lares, were located 
on the hearth, and as they were avowedly made and named after a god, 
(Eolus,) and were designed to imitate him in producing blasts of wind, 
(Varro makes the lares gods of the air,) it was natural enough to adopt 
them as household deities. Rachel was evidently an intelligent and very 
shrewd woman ; and as we have no reason to suppose she was an idolater 
after having lived twenty years in the same house with Jacob, (if indeed 
she ever was,) it is not at all likely that she coveted the images as idols, 
but only as domestic utensils of real utility — utensils which she had long 
been in the habit of using, and such as were highly desirable in setting up 
housekeeping for herself. 

Expansive Force of Steam, p. 409. The Stoics, says Plutarch, attri- 
buted earthquakes to aqueous vapor generated within the earth by subter- 
ranean heat. (Opin. Philos.) No stronger proof that the ancients were 
familiar with the force of steam could be desired : the idea could never 
have occurred except to men practically acquainted with the irresistible 
energy of this fluid when confined. If by no other means, we may be 
sure they had frequent proofs of this energy in the rupture of eolipiles 
when their vents were closed. The hypothesis of Plato respecting the 
conversion of water into air and fire, (mentioned below,) shows him to 
have been a close experimenter on steam at different temperatures. The 
old theory of boiling springs being forced from the interior by steam, im- 
plies also an acquaintance with devices for raising water by it. 

Identity of Steam and Air, pp. 395-400, 418-421. This erroneous 
opinion doubtless dates back to the early ages, during which it led to the 
invention of eolipiles, and to the first mechanical application of aqueous 
vapor, viz. to blow fires, instead of wind from bellows. It is singular, 
however, that such an opinion should have been maintained at so late a 
period as the close of the 17th century — that modern as well as an- 
cient philosophers should have taught that water rarefied by heat was 
converted into air, and that air condensed by cold was returned into 
water. Besides the examples already given, we add a few more. Of the 
elements into which philosophers formerly resolved all things material, 
viz : earth, water, air and fire, Plato suspected the last three were but 
modifications of one ; at any rate, he supposed they were convertible into 
each other — that water attenuated by heat was dilated into air, (steam,) 
and that this by a higher temperature became an invisible and glowing 
fluid or fire. (Plutarch, Opin. Philos.) Plutarch himself, in his Treatise 
on Cold, observes, " aire when it doth gather and thicken is converted into 
water, but when it is more subtile it resolveth into fire ; as also in the 
like case, water by rarefaction is resolved into aire." Pliny, in speaking 
of winds says, " aire is gathered into a wat-erie liquor." The sweating 
of walls, breathing on glass, moisture on the outside of a tumbler of water, 
&c. were considered proofs that cold condensed air into water. Lord 
Bacon, in his Sylva, Expers. 27 and 76, speaks of " the means of turning 
aire into water," and Exp. 91, relates to " the version of water into aire." 
Norton, (a contemporary of Bacon,) in his " Rehearsal of Alchemy," versi- 
fies the old doctrine thus : — 

But ayre condens'd is turn'd to raine, 
And water rarefied comes ayre again. 

Wind-Mills, p. 418. These were known in England in the 13th 
century. At the battle of Lewes, A. D. 1264, " there was many a modre 



APPENDIX. 573 

sonne broght to grounde and thekynge of Almayne was taken in awynde 
mylle" — (Hearne's Glossary to Peter Langtoft's Chronicle.) 

Intelligence of Animals exemplified in Raising Water, p. 74. Plutarch 
in his comparison of land and water animals, says, oxen were employed 
in 'raising water for the king of Persia's gardens at Susa, " by a device of 
wheels which they turned about in manner of a windlass." Each ox was 
required to raise one hundred buckets daily, and as soon as that number 
was completed, no efforts of the attendants could induce him to add another. 
Attempts were made to deceive the animals but without effect, so accu- 
rately " did they keep the reckoning." 

Imprisoning Chairs, p. 429. Such devices are very ancient. The first 
proof of Vulcan's mechanical ingenuity is said to have been a throne or 
chair of gold, with secret springs. This he presented to his mother, and 
no sooner was Juno seated in it than she felt herself pinioned and un- 
able to move. The gods interfered, and endeavored to release her, but 
without effect ; and it was not till the artist had sufficiently punished her 
for her want of affection towards him that he consented to let her go. 

Nabis, the tyrant of Lacedemon, had a device for extorting money from 
the wealthy. It was a statue of a female clothed in rich apparel. When 
any one refused to part with his wealth, the tyrant introduced him to the 
image, which by means of springs, seized him in its arms, and put him to 
the most excruciating torments, by forcing numerous bearded points into 
his body. 

Rotary Pumps, Eolipiles, Steam-Guns, &c. In " Mathematical Recrea- 
tions, or a collection of sundrie excellent problems, out of ancient and 
modern philosophers ; written first in Greek and Latin, lately compil'd in 
French by H. Van Etten, and now in English, Lon. 1674," is a rotary 
pump similar to the one we have figured at p. 285 : it is named " a most 
soveraign engine to cast water high and far off to quench fires." A goose- 
neck like those now used is also figured — also an atmospheric garden pot 
— magic cups — three-way cocks — ear trumpets, and eolipiles. Of the last, 
the author says, " some make them like a ball, some like a head painted, 
representing the wind — some put within an eolipile a crooked tube of 
many foldings to the end that the wind impetuously rolling to and fro 
within, may imitate the voice of thunder — some apply near to the hole 
small windmills, or such like, which easily turn by reason of the vapors." 
One problem relates to the " charging of a cannon without powder." 
This was done, 1st, by air as in the air-gun ; and 2d, by steam, the latter 
fluid to be generated from water confined in the breech. 

Olaus Magnus mentions eolipilic war machines, apparently similar to 
those described by Carpini, (see page 400.) They are distinguished from 
every species of guns : he calls them " brazen horses that spit fire : they 
were placed upon turning wheels, and carried about with versatile engines 
into the thickest body of the enemy : they prevailed so far to dissolve the 
enemy's forces, that there seemed more hopes of victory in them than in 
the souldiers." — (History of the Goths, book ix, chap. 3, Eng. Trans. 
Lond. 165S.) 



SUPPLEMENT 



ON 



ORACULAR AND FIGHTING EOLIPILES 



In consequence of a suggestion that a little additional matter on Eoli- 
pilic automata would add interest to this volume, a few specimens accom- 
panied with cursory observations are subjoined. The figures themselves 
constitute, perhaps, a better exposition than any thing which can now be 
written on the devices which they represent — devices once wielded with 
terrible effects by both sacerdotal and military engineers. 

Like extinct natural monsters, oracular and v/arring Eolipiles have 
disappeared from the earth and left scarcely any authentic vestiges be- 
hind. They belonged to certain states or conditions of society which 
they could not survive. Indigenous to ages of darkness, they flourished 
only in the absence of light. Receding, as civilization advanced, it may 
be said of them, as of spectres, they flutter at dawn and vanish as soon 
as the sun (of science) has risen. But they are not the less interesting 
subjects of research because of the evils they inflicted on our species, 
any more than are geological remains of mammoth beings which preyed 
on inferior tribes. Antique Eolipiles are in some respects the richest of 
artificial, as fossil bones are of natural, relics. Both are unique memo- 
rials of past times — vivid remembrancers of strange beings and dark 
deeds. The former afford proofs of stupendous animals reigning as mo- 
narchs over the woods and waters of the old world ; and the latter re 
mind us of moral monsters, preying with surprising facility upon all 
classes of men. 

Pictorial representations of idolatrous and fighting eolipiles are ex- 
ceedingly rare ; and these, few as we find them, if not transferred to mo- 
dern pages will soon be irrecoverably lost. Those which follow, though 
deplorably imperfect and obscure, will be acceptable to most readers, if 
not to all. Examples of the employment of elastic and inflammable 
fluids under singular circumstances, they can hardly fail to elicit the 
attention of inquirers into the origin and history of motive mechanism. 
They may afford hints on old and lost arts. Nor do they lack interest to 
general, or even learned readers ; for, besides illustrating ancient society 
and manners, they reflect light on the darkest passages of poetry and ro- 
mance : they add strength to the conviction that much which ancient 
literature has failed to explain, a close examination of ancient arts may 
yet render clear. Even the Eolipile, simple as it seems, promises to 
conduct inquirers, like the clew of Ariadne, through labyrinths as per- 
plexing as those which puzzled old travellers to Egypt and Crete. 

Of all the freaks of poor human nature, idolatry is the strangest ; and, 
taken in connection with evils springing from it, the most infectious and 
fatal of maladies. Hitherto ineradicable, inexpugnable, it has tainted 
all epochs, polluted all people. Its ravages have been more destructive 
than war, more distressing than famine. It has been the fertile source of 
both. Superstition, the parent of idolatry, is peculiar to man, unless de- 
mons be tormented by it, which is not unlikely ; for, besides its associa- 



Rise of Idolatry, Magic, tyc. — Monsters. 575 

tions being truly diabolical, (it has every where erected altars to Baals 
and furnished victims to Molochs,) it seems the natural, and may be the 
universal punishment of mental debasement. It is to the mind what pre- 
mature decrepitude is to the body — a horrible penalty for violating a 
fundamental law of our nature, for stunting the soul's growth, for not 
cultivating the intellectual with the physical faculties, that both might 
expand and improve together ; that infant puerilities might be succeeded 
by youthful intelligence and masculine knowledge. Instead of this, 
superstition unites dwarfed and crippled minds to grown up bodies — 
stocks the world with souls blind to their destinies and duties, and con- 
sequently to the great purposes of existence lost. Where else, then, can 
such abortions be more appropriately consigned than to the hades of ig- 
norance — of sottish delusions — to murky regions, where the sickly ima- 
gination sits an incubus on the prostrate judgment, and visions of insanity 
are reckoned as realities ; where the occupants wander among shades, 
and mutter the gibberish of phantoms. 

A stranger to natural causes, startling phenomena have ever filled the 
barbarian with dread. To account for such things he peoples the ele- 
ments with imaginary beings, who control, as he supposes, all mundane 
affairs at their will. Meteorological commotions, pain, sickness, death, 
and every public and private calamity, were held as manifestations of 
their power or their wrath ; hence the idea of propitiating beings so 
mighty and malignant ; hence idolatry with its direful progeny, magic, 
divination, necromancy, and their congeners ; and hence too the rise of 
those astute spirits who, from the beginning, have subdued the million 
by working on their fancies and fears — who have raised themselves into 
gods and sunk the rest of mankind into brutes. 

Idols were almost invariably modeled after hideous forms, because 
designed to excite terror. This was in accordance with the principles 
on which demonolatry was founded. As fear was to be awakened it was 
essential to make them correspond, as nearly as could be, with the evils 
they had power to inflict or emotions they were designed to inflame. 
To have made them more attractive than repulsive would have been 
preposterous, since it would have been neglecting the cultivation of that 
passion upon which their efficiency rested. Their makers knew their 
business better. In nothing is the versatility of ancient genius more 
apparent than in representations of the horrible — in conjuring up images 
to cause the timid to tremble and the bold to recoil — the most hideous of 
hybrids, in which were combined features derived from every thing on the 
earth and in the waters under the earth calculated to excite abhorrence 
and dread. Perhaps it is not too much to say that here also little is left 
for professors of the fine arts to do, except to imitate works of old mas- 
ters. Invention seems out of the question. Our best and worst specimens 
of diablerie and the monstrous are but copies and caricatures of originals 
in old galleries of furies, minotaurs, hydras, chimaeras, centaurs, sphinxes, 
rauns, dragons, griffins, gorgons, satyrs, harpies, hippogriffs, and other 
unearthly combinations of human bodies with those of beasts, birds, fish, 
reptiles and demons. 

But ghastly, terrific or fiendish features were not always deemed suffi- 
cient. It was expedient to communicate active qualities, such as might 
influence other senses than the sight, and which, being appropriate to 
the character an idol was intended to sustain, might serve still further to 
establish or increase its fame. Thus, some moved their heads, arms 
hands, eyes ; others spoke, groaned, smiled, perspired, laughed, &c. &c. 



576 Origin of Eolipilic Idols — Their Authors. 

A few, like the image of Nabis, squeezed unbelievers to death in their 
arms, and others, like the gods of the Zidonians, in their fury swallowed 
offenders alive. The repeated declarations in the Bible that gods of 
stone, wood and metal, neither saw, heard, ate nor "spake through their 
throats," &c. imply that by priestly artifice these and other functions were 
imitated. Had all been dumb, motionless statues, this constant denial of 
such powers to them would have been nugatory. 

The date of androidal idols is unknown : they appear to have been 
co-eval with the use of metals — are perhaps of a still earlier date, for 
modern savages have attempted them. They were found so effectual as 
to have become important instruments in the hands of rulers in ante-his- 
toric eras ; while to devise and work them became the profession of 
priests. As society advanced the treasures of states and temples were 
expended in their production, and the influence of both was exercised in 
establishing their reputation : a union of wealth and intelligence which 
accounts for the perfection and celebrity of many ancient androids. 

Ever on the look out for novel and imposing devices, the founders 
and fosterers of idolatry were too close observers to overlook the most 
appalling of nature's displays, and too keenly alive to their interests to 
remain ignorant of the means of imitating them. At an early day those 
gods were counted the greatest that had power over fire and controlled 
atmospherical tempests — that spake in thunder and whose darts were 
the electric fluid. On this belief Eolipilic idols arose, a class certainly 
among the most productive if not among the most ancient. They were 
necessarily the work of the founder, not of the carver, and, as already 
intimated, not a few of the " brazen" or " molten" images of the Old 
Testament were more or less allied to them — an inference justified by 
numerous allusions to blasts of flame, smoke and wind issuing from their 
mouths and eyes, &c. There was probably less difficulty in the apotheosis 
of Eolipilic images than of others. When idolatry was universal few 
could refuse subjection to deities that rivalled Neptune in shaking the 
ground — Jupiter in his character of the thunderer; and Pluto — the grim 
and inexorable — the sulphur-enthroned god — in the worst of his func- 
tions. To none were apotrophic hymns so fervently addressed, for none 
looked more threatening and fierce, or gave out such awful manifesta- 
tions of wrath. 

Of their authors or inventors there is no room to doubt. They were 
men whose intelligence was far in advance of their times, who mono- 
polized knowledge for the sole interest of their class. Claiming kin- 
dred with heaven, freed from worldly cares, clothed in reverend vest- 
ments, they lived apart from other people ; holy and artless in appear- 
ance, yet adepts in artifice and very devils in craft. Hierophantic magi- 
cians sojourned in temples, feasted on tythes and got rich by means of 
idols. They moved gods to compassion by wires, and roused them to 
anger by explosive compounds. Their professional attainments are in- 
disputable. In the roguish departments of physics they were never sur- 
passed. What resources and talents did those of Egypt display in com- 
peting with Moses, even to the development of lower forms of life ! 
The laboratory was their study, natural science the volume over which 
they pored, the knowledge of latent phenomena their wealth. It is im- 
possible to think on the variety, magnitude and difficulties of some of 
their impostures without conceding to them excelling ingenuity and im- 
pudence sublime. In chemistry and mechanics they were profound : of 
their contrivances few were more successful than those to which both 



JPustericTi, an Eolipilic Idol. 



577 



sciences contributed ; but of all their chemico-mechanical productions 
perhaps none performed greater deeds of renown than the Eolipile. 

To accomplish its purposes this instrument put on a strange diversity 
of shapes, and was endowed with such attributes as its adroit managers 
required ; but, purposely disguised as it was, and its movements inge- 
niously masked, its former tricks are not entirely concealed by the^veil 
which time has dropped over the stirring dramas of ancient life. It may 
be detected, though too remote to be distinct. In the deepest obscurity 
its performances are too peculiar to be mistaken. It appears to have 
flourished in mythologic and heroic ages, and, naturally enough, these 
were the times of its greatest achievements. Besides a few minor en- 
gagements, it was principally employed in personating three remark- 
able characters : — a god, a warrior, and a guardian of treasure. In the 
temple it descended with neophytes into the sacred chambers and took 
part in the lesser and sublimer mysteries, while at the altar it confirm- 
ed the faith of its worshipers by miracles wrought in their presence. 

In war its effects were once equally decisive. Its appearance alone 
sufficed, like the head of Medusa, to petrify opponents with horror. 
Superstitious troops (in early times all were superstitious) were as- 
tounded at the sight of an enemy, supernatural in form, borne along in 
chariots of clouds and whirlwinds of fire ; no stronger proof of the gods 
being against them could be adduced. Like the affrighted Philistines 
under a similar persuasion, their hearts would melt within them, and 
ere they fled they exclaimed with the warriors of Canaan, " Wo unto 
us ! Who shall deliver us out of the hands of these mighty gods V 

As a serpent or dragon, it couched by the portals of palaces or lay 
at the entrance of caverns to protect the plunder its owners had gotten 
together. 

The annexed figures and subsequent remarks may serve to elucidate in 
a feeble degree a few of its performances under each of these characters. 

Idols, especially Eolipilic ones, belong to a department of ecclesias- 
tical history hitherto little examined and less 
understood. True, they recall no very pleasing 
associations, yet they make us acquainted with 
many curious transactions. This figure is a re- 
presentation of Pusterich, a bronze Eolipilic 
god of the ancient Germans, described at page 
399, to which the reader is referred. The burn- 
ing fluids and flame issued from the mouth and 
the eye or orifice in the middle of the forehead. 

This is not near so repulsive as many an- 
cient and modern idols : compared with some 
it might almost be deemed engaging. Perhaps 
its admirers were too far advanced to relish a 
mongrel deity, or one with an extra number of 
heads or limbs. It is but one among many of 
its kind which might be adduced, had we the 
history of numerous bronze images extant, or 
of others noticed in antiquarian works. Seve- 
ral have openings behind and fitted for plugs, 
as if designed for charging them with liquids. 

There is an impressive resemblance between this, figure and that of a 
Cyclop, and there may be a real similitude between idolo of this kind 
and the three fabled sons of Neptune and Amphitrite. As remarked fur- 

37 




No. 287. Ancient Eolipilic Idol. 



578 Cyclops. — Fighting Eolipiles. 

ther on, fire-breathing and other mythic monsters were not all mere vi 
sions, mystic emblems, or hieroglyphical pictures, but actual brazen be- 
ings, of the forms and with many of the functions described — in other 
words, Eolipilic idols, personified as all idols were. The reader need 
not be reminded of the relation of the Cyclops to fire, since they were aids 
to Vulcan, and were destroyed by Apollo for manufacturing or ejecting, 
like Pusterich, thunderbolts. They are sometimes described as having 
but one eye, at other times represented with three — two in the ordinary 
places, and a third in the forehead, as in the preceding figure. [See plate 
page 141, vol. 1, Fosbroke's Encyc. Antiq.] This idol is supposed to have 
belonged originally tc a high antiquity, and may possibly be a genuine 
Cyclop. 

Two or three more metallic deities, which appear to be Eolipilic, might 
here be introduced ; but as the fact is uncertain, and nothing but con- 
jectures could accompany them, we forbear. Had more data been ac- 
cessible the subject would needs be a thrilling one. No work of imagi- 
nation could be richer in interest or more fertile in intrigue and plots 
than accounts of idolatrous androids of the more advanced nations of old, 
of the puppet-machinery in each famous temple, and the by-play by 
which the reverend showmen set them off to advantage, lulled suspicion 
and kept their audiences in the right humor. We may descant as we 
please on epic poets, on tragic and comic authors and actors, but what 
were the best of them compared to those proto-fathers of fiction and his- 
trionic professions 1 Men whose theatres were temples, whose stages 
were altars : master players on the passions, who excited what emotions 
they pleased, and impressed on their congregations an abiding sense of 
the realities of the illusions they exhibited. The subject reaches down to 
the nonage of society and comes up with it to our own days; has relation 
to the most stupendous system of deception ever conceived, and the most 
successful one ever practised by man upon man ; affords the most de- 
plorable and durable examples of human credulity and cunning ; in- 
volves the early history of all races and of nearly all arts. Its exposition 
of principles of ancient science would be highly instructive, and their 
villanous applications often amusing. The mystery that envelopes it 
irresistibly whets curiosity. The little that is known makes us anxious to 
push aside the skreen that hides from our view the ingenious and elabo- 
rate meehanism by which pagan monks emasculated the species and 
kept an awe-stricken world at their feet. 

The following figures illustrate the fighting qualities of the Eolipile. 
As a war-instrument it became better known than as an oracle confined 
in temples. In the field it was exposed to the scrutiny of the curious as 
well as of its immediate managers, so that, whether captured or not, the 
secret of its construction could not long remain one, or the device be 
confined, if much employed, to one people. Nor did it cast off its pre- 
tensions to divinity with this change of occupation, but rather sustained 
them, for it was as a god that it first became terrible in battle — as such 
its military achievements shook neighboring nations with alarm and ac- 
quired for it a celebrity that has reached to our times. The nature of its 
performances remained the same as at the altar, except that it now did 
not hesitate to destroy those whom it could not convince. 

Every people, no matter how barbarous, esteemed their own gods su- 
perior to others. It was indispensable to the interests of priests to keep 
this conviction alive under all exigencies ; hence while victories served 
to establish it, defeats did not overthrow it. These, it was artfully sug 



Deceptions of ilie Pagan Priesthood. 579 

gested, were only proofs of a deity having become temporary offended, 
either for not being properly invoked or on account of indignities offered 
to his ministers. It was only to make his proteges sensible of his dis- 
pleasure that on such occasions he left them a prey to their foes ! Pagan 
history is full of examples, they abound in the Iliad, which opens with 
one. Thus the character of an oracle or idol, and the influence of its 'offi- 
cials were ingeniously preserved whether those who trusted in it became 
conquerors or conquered, victors or victims. Such was the practice un- 
der ordinary circumstances, the god remaining the while undisturbed in 
his fane ; but when extraordinary calamities threatened, when an invad- 
ing army approached and his worshippers were menaced with captivity 
or famine, corresponding efforts were made to appease and even to com- 
pel him to be propitious. Bribes were held out, votive gifts, hecatombs 
and new temples promised — processions in his honor were got up, with 
sacred banners, relics, &c. borne aloft, (an European practice through 
the middle ages, and an Asiatic one yet.) Then to make sure of success 
by connecting his fate with that of his followers, the latter took him down 
from his shrine and carried him to the battle-ground, under a belief that 
he would not suffer himself to be taken if he were disposed to leave 
them in the lurch. On the same principle idolaters of every age have 
acted. The early Jews were not free from the strange infatuation, nor 
is it easy to see how they could have been better informed previous to 
or at the period of the Exodus. They were as much attached to idols as 
the Egyptians, and took the first opportunity that the absence of Moses 
presented for making an image of Apis. After the severe defeat at 
Aphek, some of the ignorant got up a cry to bring the ark to the camp and 
renew the contest under its auspices. " When it cometh among us it may 
save us out of the hands of our enemies." To this the better informed 
probably acceded with the hope that Jehovah would protect it, and the 
people for its sake, but they were mistaken — they were routed, thirty 
thousand were slain, " the ark of God was taken," and exhibited in the 
principal cities of the captors for a period of seven months, during which 
Phenician priests and artists were probably not very scrupulous in ex- 
amining its contents, its designs and decoratio is, the cherubim of ham- 
mered gold, their forms, features, wings, &c. 

In this same manner warring Eolipiles became known to others than 
their designers : as gods and demi-gods they made their debut in battle. 
As such they were victorious, and as such were eventually captured. 
Exaggerated accounts of some of the earliest are preserved in mythologi- 
cal annals. So awful were their attributes and so terrific their appearance, 
that their very looks overcame their opponents. Of this Briareus was 
an example ; but when their artificial nature became known they put on 
less formidable shapes, their efficacy then depending more on what they 
did than how they looked. In comparatively modern epochs they 
never, however, attained much beauty, if we might judge of the one 
on the following page. 

The age to which the specimen figured in the next cut belonged is 
unknown. It and No. 289 are from a Latin folio published in Paris in 
1535, containing Vegetius on Military Machinery and Institutions, Elian 
on Tactics, Frontinus on Strategems, and the Book of Modestus on 
Military Affairs : — collated from Ancient codices by Budeus, the celebrated 
French critic. Attached to, and paged with Vegetius, are one hundred 
and twenty folio illustrations, rudely executed on wood. They are co 
pies of those of the old German translation to which we have frequently 



580 



Ancient Fighting Eolipile. 



referred, with the exception of a couple of reduced fac-similes which 
Ore now before the reader, fa) 




No. 288. Ancient Fighting Eolipile. 

As not a word of explanation accompanies this singular figure, (not 
any other in the book,) and little or nothing is to be found in Vegetius 
or other Roman authors to aid us, all that we can offer must be received 
as conjecture. If the magnitude of the machine be judged from other 
illustrations in the collection, it was colossal. No object is portrayed 
near it by which to infer its relative dimensions. The general outline 
represents the human bust, and the whole seems to have been an enor- 
mous Pusterich on wheels. It probably combined the god with the war- 
rior, assuming the character of each as occasion required. It is no bad 
representative of both ; and the powers it possessed of punishing its 
enemies are as obvious as they were awful. The ignited jet issued from 
the conical tube whose wide end is riveted to the forehead — (a small 
pipe descending from it to the bottom of the bust, as in the air-vessels 
of fire-engines,) and possibly, also, out of its eyes and mouth. The pro- 
longation of the nose, and the daggers projecting from the mouth, were 
intended to ward off blows during assaults, and to prevent access to 
it, lest the orifice or orifices should be spiked or otherwise closed. Point- 
ed projections of this kind are quite common adjuncts in old war en- 
gines. 

As this Eolipile is figured at rest and not in use, neither fire, fire-place, 
nor the mode of charging it is delineated. The fuel was probably applied 
in the lower part of the bust behind, though it may have been kindled 



(a) " Fl. Vegetii Renati viri illustris de re militari libri quatuor. Sextiivlii Fron- 
tini viri consularis de strategematis libri totidem. iEliani de instruendis aciebus 
liber unus. Modesti de vocabulis rei militaris liber unus. Item picturse bellicae 
cxx. passim Vegetio adjectse. Collata sunt omnia ad antiquos codices, maxime 
Bud^i, quod teslabiti r iElianus. Parisiis, mdxxxv." 



Eolipilic War- Dragon. 



581 



externally, the head being for that purpose inclined backwards and rest 
ing on the cornigerous and auricular prolongations, which would, like 
the feet of a caldron, form a tripod to support it. But much allowance 
must be made for old illustrations. Scarcely ever is an attempt made to 
delineate interior parts or external details. One object of the horn and 
ears was obviously to vary the direction of the jet, to incline the tube to 
the right or left, up or down, somewhat in the manner of the syringe 
engine of Besson. The wheels are solid, and as there are but two, some 
mechanism for preserving the image in an upright position was neces- 
sary : as they moved on separate axles the tube could as readily be 
turned in a lateral direction as it could be elevated or depressed. The 
manner of conveying this machine to considerable distances is not indi- 
cated, probably because it was rather intended as a stationary means of 
defence, than, like the next, a moveable one for attack. 




No. 289. Eolipilic War-Dragon. 

Here is a variety of the griffin, hippogriff, or dragon genus, placed on 
four wheels, and evidently designed to break the ranks of an opposing 
army, by being driven through them. The burning liquids rushed out ot 
two rows of small holes on the upper jaw or lip : the effect forcibly re- 
minding one of mythic monsters from whose nostrils went forth smoke, 
and from whose mouths issued flame. No provision is shown for raising 
or lowering the jets, nor was any necessary, for from the elevation and 
position of the orifices, troops among whom this engine forced its way 
could not avoid either right or left its fluid and scorching missive. The 
rod held by the captain or leader is enlarged and pierced or cloven at 
its upper end, where it is joined to the head : it is apparently a lever by 
which the plug of a cock was turned to open and shut off the discharge. 
We may suppose the passage was closed in the present position of the 
lever, and that to open it the manager pulled back the end he grasps, 
until, like a modern artillerist, he became sufficiently in the rear to be 
out of harm's way when the jets found vent ; he then could join his asso- 
ciates in directing the monster's movements. The wheels, as in the last 
figure, are represented solid, a feature undoubtedly genuine ; for it was 
the uniform practice to attempt to stop the progress of such war-chariots 
as had wheels with spokes, by throwing spears, &c. between the latter; 



582 Its effects in battle. — Dragons figured on Banners. 

and hence such wheels were sometimes covered with boards or plates of 
iron previous to entering into battle. 

The sword or dagger-like tongue kept an enemy from approaching 
too near in front, while the flames protected both sides. It would not 
nave answered the purposes of this war-engine to have made its sides 
horrent with bayonets, for they would have retarded its progress by con- 
tact with every obstacle within their reach. Its efficiency depended chief- 
ly on the velocity and precision of its movements, it would therefore be 
divested of every thing calculated to interfere with these. The inclina- 
tion of the tongue was designed to remove obstacles from the path. 
Had the spike been horizontal it would have transfixed objects it met 
with, and the progress of the machine would soon have been stopped. 
This machine is apparently represented as in times of peace, for, unlike 
most others in the collection, no signs of war are delineated in the land- 
scape. The fire was perhaps applied externally, as in the case of Pus- 
terich, the brazen monster belonging to the Tyrant of Agrigentum, and 
other ancient devices of the kind: but this part of the subject is very 
obscure. Like chariots with swords and scythes fixed to them, and 
others with similar weapons revolving in their fronts, this machine when 
in active service was most likely urged forward by horses yoked behind ; 
01 by a number of men applying their force to bars attached to and ra- 
diating from the rear — both ancient and very common war devices. 

An enormous Eolipile, formed after the above pattern, charged with 
inflammable liquids, and driven furiously and unexpectedly upon a su- 
perstitious foe, must not only have borne all before it, like a modern 
locomotive, but must have rendered opposition hopeless until its contents 
were expended. 

The dimensions of this war dragon cannot safely be inferred from 
those of the men attached to it, for in most of the plates in the work 
whence it is taken, no kind of proportion is preserved. Soldiers raising 
ladders to scale the walls of high towers are often drawn sufficiently tall 
to reach the roof with their hands. 

As the name of a war machine, the term dragon was continued to 
modern times. It was early given to pieces of ordnance, to devices re- 
sembling in their attributes ancient Eolipilic monsters. Culverines were 
originally called fiery-dragons. The Draconarii of the Romans bore 
dragons on their standards ; the Parthians, Indians, Persians, Scythians, 
Assyrians, Normans, Saxons, Welsh, and all the Celtic and Gothic na- 
tions painted the same thing upon their banners and pennons, as the 
Chinese, Russians, Tartars, &c. do now. Modern dragoons have pro- 
bably also derived their designation from soldiers who formerly managed 
Eolipilic dragons, as in the preceding figure ; the name being preserved 
in war's vocabulary after the office and instrument were forgotten. Or- 
ders of chivalry were named after the dragon, and heraldry abounds 
with its figures. 

Let us now turn to the history of the Goths, by Olaus Magnus. (Basil 
ed. 1567.) The fourth chapter of the ninth book is headed, " De cereis 
equis ignivomis" — "Of brazen horses that vomit fire." The materials of 
the chapter are condensed from the History of the Danes, by Saxo 
Grammaticus, a writer who flourished A. D. 1140. The principal inci- 
dent relates to the stratagetic skill of an old king, Regnerus, who was 
eventually put to death by his sons, Daxon and Dian. On one occasion 
the two rebellious brothers invaded their father's kingdom, having been 
furnished for the purpose with a large army by king Ruthenus, whose 



Brazen Horses thai vomited Fire. 



583 



daughters they had married. Alarmed at the mighty forces brought 
against him, Regnerus ordered a number of brazen, fire-breathing horses 
to be secured on chariots, and whirled suddenly into the densest body 
of his enemies. The manoeuvre succeeded, and his unnatural sons were 
put to flight. It appears that the chariots and their burdens were ex- 
ceedingly massive, since they overwhelmed whatever opposed them 
We add the passage at large from Saxo. It will be perceived that he 
is silent respecting the fire-vomiting faculty of the metallic chargers, 
though that was clearly implied in the opinion of the Gothic historian ; 
an opinion that can hardly be questioned. 

Post haec Regnerus, expeditionem in Hellesponticos parans, vocata- 
que Danorum concione, saluberrimas se populo leges laturum promit- 
tens, ut unusquisque paterfamilias, secut ante, quem minimi inter 
liberos duxerat, militaturum exhiberet, ita tunc valentioris operae filium 
aut probations fidei servum armaret, edixit. Quo facto omnibus, quos 
ex Thora procreverat, filiis, praeter ubbonen, assumptis, Hellespontum 
ejusque regem Dian variis contusum bellis lacessendo perdomuit. Ad 
ultimum eundem creberrimis discriminibus implicatum extinxit. Cujus 
filii Dian et Daxon, olim Ruteni regis filias maritali sorte complexi, im- 
petratis a socero copiis, ardentissimo spiritu paternae vindictae negotium 
rapuerunt. Quorum Regnerus immensum animadvertens exercitum, 
difndentia copiarum habita, equos ceneos ductilibus rotalis superpositos ac 
versatilibus curriculis circumductos in confertissimos hostes maxima vi 
exagitari praecepit. Quae res tantum ad laxandam adversariorum aciem 
valuit, ut vincendi spes magis in machinamento quam milite reposita 
videretur, cujus intolerabilis moles, quicquid impulit obruit. Altero 
ergo ducum interfecto altero fuga sublapso, universus Hellisponticorum 
cessit exercitus. Scithse quoque, Daxon arctissimo materni sanguinis 
vinculo contingentes, eodem obstriti discrimine refuruntur. Quorum 
provincia Witserco attributa, Rutenorum reg. parum viribus fidens, for- 
midolosa Regneri arma fuga praecurrere maturavit. 

[Saxo Grammatici Historia Dania. Edited by P. E. Muller. Copenhagen, 1839. Liber ix. p. 452.] 

In a note on the Equos iEneos, the editor, not knowing that such 
things had ever been, observes, " commentum nescio unde petitum." 




No. 290. Eolipilic War-Engines. 

The cut No. 290 is copied from the rude illustrations of the fourth and 
fifth chapters, Book ix, of Olaus Magnus 



A figure of one of the brazen. 



584 Greek-fire. — Copper images of Men. 

horses is in the foreground, but as usual it is a mere outline, and was 
perhaps designed by the illustrator of the Gothic historian's work from 
the meagre description its pages or those of Saxo afford. Nothing defi- 
nite can be derived from it which the text does not furnish. Neither the 
carriage nor its load comes up to the description : the words imply that 
the images had some elastic and revolving mechanism of their own, and 
versatile chariots meant something more than common carts. 

The fifth chapter (Book ix) is on the same subject, and to this effect. 
' Vincentius in Spec. Histo. L. xxxi. Cap. 10, asserts that the king of the 
Indians, commonly called Prester John, being attacked by a powerful 
army of Ethiopian Saracens, enemies of the christian faith, delivered 
himself by a stratagem not unlike that of Regnerus, for he made copper 
images of men and mounted each upon a horse. Behind every image was 
a man to govern it, and to blow with a bellows, through holes made for 
the purpose, on fumid materials inserted beforehand into the body of the 
image. Provided with a large number of these he proceeded vigorously 
against his enemies, whom Vincentius calls Mongols or Tartars. The 
mounted images being ranged side by side in front of the hostile army, 
their managers were directed to advance, and when arrived within a 
short distance of the foe to commence blowing with their bellows the 
smoking fire within, and with a continual blast to fill the air with dark- 
ness — the consequences of which were that many of the invaders were 
slain and others took to sudden flight. Large numbers of horsemen and 
horses were burnt to death and some reduced to ashes by Greek-fire, 
composed of the following ingredients, by the artificers of Prester John : 

Aspaltum, nepta, dragantum, pix quoque Greca, 
Sulphur, veTnicis, de petrolio quoque vitro, 
Mercurii, sal gemmse Grseci dicitur ignis. 

Item : Sulphur, petrolium, colopho, resi, terebinthi, 

Aspaltum, camphora, nepta, armo, benedictum.' 

Magnus could make nothing out of these old poetic recipes. He thought 
it would be a vain task to attempt their explanation, and wicked to revive 
the invention. He seems to have been of an opinion — once heartily enter- 
tained — that the souls of the authors of Greek-fire and gunpowder were 
reaping their appropriate rewards in perdition, doomed for ever to taste 
of torments which their "devilish devices" inflicted on others. Vincen- 
tius, or Vincent De Beauvais, was a learned monk of the 13th century, 
and one of the most voluminous writers whose works furnished employ- 
ment to the first race of printers. He died about 1260. His "Speculum 
Historiale" was printed in 1473. The most striking incident drawn from 
it by the Gothic writer we quoted at page 400, from Carpini, a contem- 
porary monk, who began his travels in 1245, and to whom he of Beauvais 
was most likely indebted for it. 

If the reader will now look again at the last cut he will find on the 
back ground a miniature of one of the brazen horsemen in the act of 
attacking the Mongols, and with a living soldier on the crupper per- 
forming his part of the business with bellows. There is certainly an air 
of romance about these figures ; but accounts of them reaching us through 
ages and hot-beds of legends, might be expected to be loaded with 
apocryphal matters. Of the main feature, that of ejecting flame and 
smoke, there is no room to question, since it is corroborated by old 
writers on Greek-fire, by the brazen horses of Saxo, and the preceding 
figures in this supplement. But Carpini's relation does not savor so 



Greek-fire a liquid. — Modes of ejecting it. 585 

much of poetry as may be supposed. The principal difficulty is in 
mounting the images on natural horses; but this is not a necessary in- 
ference. They may have been artificial as well as their automaton 
riders — and we believe were so — were secured, like those mentioned 
b'y Saxo, on carriages, and behind them the bellows-blowers were loca- 
ted. If this is not what Carpini meant, we should say he misunderstood 
his informant. Living horses, with flames roaring and rushing from ori- 
fices close to their eyes and ears, would be as likely to be affrighted as 
those they attacked : however drilled, they could not in such circumstan- 
ces be managed without difficulty and without requiring the whole at- 
tention of their riders, but the latter were entirely engaged in urging the 
fires at the most critical periods of the charge, leaving the animals to 
pursue the right course of themselves. We presume the metalline ima- 
ges were a species of Hippocentaurs, the flames issuing from the hu- 
man bust, and the fluid and other materials contained in the spacious 
abdomen below. 

It is said these equestrian images cast forth Greek-fire ; were they 
then Eolipiles 1 ? mounted Pusterichs] i. e. were they charged with li- 
quids, or with dry substances, which once ignited continued of them- 
selves to burn until the whole became expended 1 From the want of 
specific information it is difficult to arrive at a definite conclusion on this 
point. The evidence, however, preponderates in favor of their Eolipi- 
lic character. Had the contents been a composition similar to any thing 
used in modern pyrotechnics, what need of fire to heat them and of bel- 
lows to urge the fire % How did the flaming stream continue to issue 
from its orifice with unabated force as the material diminished within, 
as it sank far below the place of exit ? Would not the image be liable 
to explode ere its contents were half emptied 1 If not, why have me- 
tallic images'? Those of fragile materials would have done. Again, the 
reaction of the jet, like that of a rocket, would require no small force to 
be overcome : it would be very apt to shoot the brazen warriors back 
among their friends, instead of their carrying destruction among their 
foes. But not one of these objections, and others which might be named, 
apply to Eolipiles — to a liquid discharged by the elasticity of its own 
vapor, or the vapor itself thus shot forth. With these instruments the 
employment of fuel was necesary and the application of a blast in time of 
action important if not indispensable. But, what is more to the point, 
Greek-fire was a liquid. See p. 307, 8. Meyrick, in his account of ancient 
armor, gives its composition from an author of the time of Edward III. 
Several ingredients enumerated are mentioned in the preceding re- 
cipes from Vincentius : — An equal quantity of pulverized rosin, sul- 
phur and pitch ; one fourth of opopanax and of pigeons' dung well dried, 
were dissolved in turpentine water, or oil of sulphur : then put into a 
close and strong glass vessel and heated for fifteen days in an oven, after 
which the whole was distilled in the manner of spirit of wine, and kept 
for use. Another account makes it to consist chiefly of turpentine 
water (spirits of turpentine) slowly distilled with turpentine gum. It 
was said to ignite by coming in contact with water. 

Two distinct modes of dispersing the horrible fluid are mentioned ; 
one by forcing-pumps, the other by "blowing" it through tubes and 
from the mouths, &c. of metallic monsters. The former is noticed in 
connection with naval warfare, and the latter, if we mistake not, was 
chiefly employed in conflicts on land. Any one can see how difficult it 
would be for soldiers promptly to apply pumps in the confusion of bat- 



586 Greek-Fire and modes of projecting it. 

tie. Appaiatus equal to our fire-engines would have been of little effect, 
for the jets could but feebly be sustained, and worse directed while the 
reservoirs, engines and men were in motion, whirling hither and thither, 
now advancing and anon retreating. We read also of portable " sipliones" 
being also used, but these and the necessary vessels to hold the liquid 
were still less likely to be effective except on ships in close combat; 
where to keep up conflagrations, the fluid could be ejected, cold and un- 
ignited, on parts already kindled — as if our engines were to be employed 
to lanch oil or turpentine on objects already in flames. On ship-board, 
the reservoirs were always at hand, and both men and the fixed pumps 
they worked relatively at rest, and moreover protected either between 
decks or in equally secure locations, so that one or two individuals alone 
sufficed to direct the fiery streams over a galley's bow or sides, and 
through flexible or jointed ajutages. 

The expression " blown through tubes," &c. could, of course, have no 
reference to any thing like the sarbacan, nor to any employment of hu- 
man lungs. No adequate and no continuous force could have been ob- 
tained except by artificial means, and of those by none so readily as by 
the Eolipile. That this instrument was intended, the figures in the cut 
strongly indicate. If the vapor of the fiery liquid was ejected, we know 
that nothing else could have answered. But both the idea and expression 
are used at this day with respect to modern Eolipiles : engineers " blow 
off" steam by opening a safety valve or other aperture of a boiler; and 
when one of these explodes, on shore or afloat, how often is it said of 
missing individuals and objects, they were " blown overboard" — or 
" blown to such and such distances." On a review then of the particu- 
lars that have reached us respecting the famous Greek-fire, it seems that 
the machinery for ejecting it on shipboard was a species of pump ; and 
on land by large boilers, suspended on wheels and driven by horses or 
men, made in fantastic forms of men and animals, fiom whose mouths 
the flaming torrents were ejected. This, ancient writers have asserted, 
and the figures we have given confirm. 

That Greek-fire was rather the revival of an old thing than the dis- 
covery of a new one, and that both the fire and the machines for dis- 
persing it — Eolipilic devices infinitely more grotesque than any figured 
on these pages — were known in extremely remote times, is, we think, 
pretty clear. Under this impression some further remarks are submitted 
with the view of eliciting attention to a curious and interesting subject 
of archeological research — one which, it will be conceded, appears to 
reflect light on old legends as well as on old Eolipiles. 

The history of idolatrous and other Eolipilic automata is lost or per- 
haps never was written, and now the opportunity, the materials and men 
for preparing it are gone ; the requisite knowledge did not sufficiently 
transpire beyond the walls of temples, and even there was confined to a 
privileged few. Such a record could only have been furnished by those 
who had every earthly inducement to suppress it — by men whose private 
labors were devoted to disguise the elements of deceptive devices they 
employed, and whose public administrations still further concealed them. 
It may therefore be concluded that such an expose was never made, or, 
if made, religiously reserved for the perusal of heads of colleges or the 
eyes of arch-magicians alone. It is to be regretted that so valuable a 
fund of hidden knowledge, of mechanical and chemical combinations, of 
singular discoveries and inventions ; a bibliotheca for philosophers and 



Mythic Monsters and Dragon-killing Heroes. 587 

artisans, illustrating, probably, every branch of ancient science and ex 
posing the secret workings of some of the shrewdest spirits of antiquity — 
should be lost. It would have enabled us to repeat staple tricks of Baby- 
lonian sorcerers and soothsayers, and would have placed us in a more 
favorable position for observation than was Pharaoh when he commanded 
"the magicians of Egypt and the wise men thereof" to exhibit their 
skill in his presence. 

It is with Eolipiles as with other materiel of old jugglers. The few 
broken specimens and straggling notices which have come down are in- 
teresting but unsatisfactory; they tantalize with a sip, and make the 
mouth water for more, provoking a thirst which they cannot allay. That 
these instruments are of a very high antiquity is undeniable, and that 
they were occasionally used to eject inflammable fluids for deceptive 
and destructive purposes is equally certain. The resemblance in the 
forms and functions of those we have figured to mythological fire-spout- 
ing monsters, is too striking to escape observation. And is there any ab- 
surdity in supposing both were artificial ; that the latter were literally 
what they are described ; and that stories of dragon-killing heroes are 
not quite so romantic as they appear ] A literal interpretation of such 
matters may appear preposterous, but a slight view of the subject will 
convince unprejudiced minds that it is not half so absurd as many receiv- 
ed metaphorical solutions, nor is it, like them, embarrassed with insur- 
mountable difficulties ; on the contrary, it renders things intelligible 
which paleologists have not ventured to explain, and which, without re- 
ference to Eolipilic automata, we presume they never can explain — 
things so bizarre they know not what to make of them. But once admit 
they were what they pretend to be, and there is little difficulty in receiv- 
ing them ; interpret them by some other rule, and we are at once cast 
adrift on the ocean of conjecture. 

Admit that mythic characters obtained celebrity from battling with 
Eolipilic opponents; that some, at least, of the dragons and many-headed 
monsters of antiquity performed actions ascribed to them — belched out 
smoke and flame, shrieked and growled, and on the approach of strangers 
or "curious impertinents" shook themselves, sprung from their caves, 
(they were commonly and for good reasons located in dark places) often 
destroyed those who attacked them, and sometimes disappeared in sudden 
bursts of thunder and amidst showers of thunderbolts — very much as 
their descendants, the steam-dragons of the present day, unfortunately 
now and then do. Admit this, and passages in history, poetry and tradi- 
tion, hitherto inexplicable, become recitals of facts ; embarrassing enig- 
mas are unriddled, and the supposed offspring of fancy are found sober 
children of truth. That Greek and Roman writers did not perceive this 
is little to the point, since they do not appear to have been acquainted 
with fighting Eolipiles; they were therefore necessarily at a loss to ex- 
plain, except by metaphor, conflicts between these machines and heroes 
of ancient days. But the presiding spirits at Eleusis and Delphos could 
have furnished the clew, and, had it suited their views, could have illus- 
trated the entire series of fire-breathing monsters, by reference to their 
own collections ; for, as before remarked, Eolipiles went from the altar to 
the field. 

In those remote times, when superstition reigned paramount, when 
common objects and events were construed into omens and uncommon 
ones were looked on as prodigies, the defeat of an army by fire-breathing 
warriors would form an epoch in barbarian annals ; exaggerated descrip- 



588 Wars of the Giants. 

tions of flaming chariots, of giants, dragons, hippogriffs and hybrids of 
every horrid form, and possessing supernatural powers, would be bla- 
zoned abroad and become permanently preserved in tradition. It could 
not be otherwise ; and that such was really the case is evident, for my- 
thology and remote history is replete with these very things ; with battles 
between Gods, Cyclops and Titans. But in process of time the artificial 
nature of warring Eolipiles would sooner or later be suspected and as- 
certained. Intrepid individuals took courage to attack and had the good 
fortune to destroy one. Success made them heroes, if not something 
more. To swell their fame the form and faculties of their strange oppo- 
nents were distorted, and the story repeated, with every addition that a 
love of the marvellous could invent or credulity receive, till, as ages 
rolled away, it became just what such stories yet extant are — stories of 
monster-killing gallants from Jason to Saint George. 

WARS OF THE GIANTS. 

In the wars of the giants, fire, thunder and thunderbolts were the 
chief destructive agents, and these, we are told, were produced by and 
ejected from monsters, apparently precisely in the manner of Pusterich. 
Some had more heads and arms than have Hindoo deities, with bodies 
terminating, like that of Dagon, in legs resembling fish or serpents. 
When brought into battle (heir terrible aspects and the volumes of flame 
they poured forth filled their enemies, the gods, with consternation. 
Defeated, these fled into Egypt, where they learned the nature of their 
ardent foes. Jupiter, Hercules, and their associate refugees having thus 
ascertained that their victors were not invincible, recovered courage, 
returned, and were at last victorious. Now what, when stripped of orien- 
tal ornament, does this amount to, but a conflict similar to that between 
Prester John and his Mongolian invaders ; between Regnerus and his 
unnatural sons, and others in which fire-spouting images, figured in this 
supplement, were employed % The most ingenious conquering, whether 
gods or mortals were combatants. The names of the mythic parties 
were misnomers, for the deities were ignorant braggarts — they could not 
withstand their " earth-born " enemies, but fled for refuge and instruction 
into other lands. The accounts remarkably resemble Chinese bulletins 
of fights with Europeans — contests between modern "Celestials" and 
" outside, barbarians." For, ancient like, existing "sons of heaven" 
seem to have placed at first as much dependence upon their divine pre- 
tensions and their comminations as in their weapons, and therefore were 
defeated. The giants were probably ingenious or scientific men — the 
Roger Bacons of their day — in advance of the age and consequently de- 
nounced, as such have ever been, by self-styled heirs of heaven, as infidel 
dogs or children of Tartarus. 

The circumstance of the divinities flying to Egypt when they could not 
cope with the fire-breathing monsters, or rather with the cunning mon- 
ster-makers, is remarkable. There they, like less pretenders, improved 
themselves in knowledge. That it was an early Pharaonic policy to en- 
courage the discontented of neighboring nations, is abundantly proved 
in the Old Testament. " Wo to them that go to Egypt for help — that 
strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh !" [See Isa. chaps. 30 and 
31 ; Jerem. 42 and 43.] How deep and general must have been the im- 
pression of the power of the Pharaohs to call forth the declaration — " Now 
the Egyptians are men and not God ; their horses flesh and not spirit." 



Typhon. — Colchian B?dls and Dragon. 589 

TYPHON. 

Here is a description of Typhon, the most famous of fighting giants — 
can it be doubted that he was a genuine Pusterich ? " He had nume- 
rous heads resembling those of serpents or dragons. Flames of devour- 
ing fire rushed hissing from his mouth and eyes ; he uttered horrid yells 
like the dissonant shrieks of different animals. He was no sooner born 
than he warred with the gods and put them to flight." Not a circum- 
stance is here mentioned that does not accord with his alleged artificial 
character, and there are few others which do not harmonize with it. 
He went to battle as soon as born, that is, as soon as he was made. The 
whole family was said to be " earth-born" — the members rising out of 
the ground completely formed, &c. ; indications of their gross not ideal 
nature, of their secret construction in subterranean workshops — the lat- 
ter a precaution essential to the recognition of, and belief in their super- 
natural origin. 

She sings, from earth's dark womb how Typhon rose, 

And struck with mortal fear his heavenly foes. — [Ovid, Met. v.] 

The name, Typlwn, is derived from a word signifying, " to smoke." 
The goddess of night was the mother of monsters ; an enigma beau- 
tifully expressive of the secret fabrication of Eolipilic imagery. Typhon 
and his brethren were moreover sons of Tartarus as well as of Terra — 
were brought forth of earth by the assistance of hell — a trait still further 
significative, and particularly of the element by which they were anima- 
ted, that from which their terrors were derived. Demons they were in 
shape, occupations and attributes; in the torments they inflicted and 
the victims they slew ; tangible, and the most perfect representations of 
evil principles and passions. The paternity of these monsters is the 
same as that given to modern ordnance, so true it is that similar things 
ever produce the same ideas. A thousand times have guns and gun- 
powder been described as infernal inventions, as conceptions injected 
by demons and matured by their influence. 

Does the idea seem too gross for contending gods and demi-gods to 
fight with Eolipiles 1 Let it be remembered that Milton could find no 
warring engines so appropriate for Satan and his hosts as artillery. In 
fact, poets can only arm mortal or immortal warriors with weapons and 
agents that are known, although they may exaggerate them. All sym- 
bolic imagery must be derived, directly or remotely, from earthly types. 
The author of Paradise Lost necessarily followed, in this respect also, 
the old mythologists he copied, and as " fiery monsters," whether guns 
or Eolipiles, are not in their nature and effects much unlike, we find 
little difference in ancient poetic descriptions of one, and modern poetic 
descriptions of the other. Indeed they might often be interchanged with- 
out detection. The monsters described by Milton as mounted upon 
wheels, whose mouths with hideous orifices gaped, and which, with im- 
petuous fury, belched from their deep throats chained-thunderbolts and 
iron hail, are therefore no stronger proofs of guns and gunpowder being 
known during the English Commonwealth, than are fire-breathing hy- 
brids of mythology, of the early use of Eolipilic engines. 



THE C0LCHIAX BULLS AND DRAGON. 

If we turn to later examples we shall find circumstances leaking out 
which betray the artificial character of mythic monsters. The Argo- 
nautic, like all early expeditions, was of a piratical nature. Its object 



•590 Medea and Jason. — Flying- Dragons. 

the Coleliian treasury, or the " golden fleece," a term in ancient Syriac 
implying treasures of gold. These were protected by a dragon, and by 
two brazen-horned and hoofed bulls, which flashed from their mouths 
and nostrils flames and smoke. As usual, they were located at the en- 
trance of a cave. 

•• Thick smoke their subterraneous home proclaims ; 
" From their broad nostrils pour the rolling flames." 

[Apollonius, L. iii.] 

The daughter of iEetes (the Colchian king) becomes enamored of 
Jason. The lovers swear eternal fidelity to each other ; and to save the 
adventurer's life, Medea explains to him the secret of the monster's 
powers. Thus informed, and furnished with an ointment to protect his 
face and hands from the singeing blast at the onset, he approached with 
a smiling countenance, as well he might, and quickly, to the chagrin of 
the monarch, subdued the " brazen " monsters. If any doubt remains re- 
specting the true character of this transaction, it is greatly if not wholly 
removed by the subsequent conduct of Medea. She every where evin- 
ces familiarity with the principles of the Eolipile — with secret applications 
of fire, steam, sulphur, inflammable fluids and explosive compositions. 
(See page 120.) By the adroit use of these, which she introduced into 
Greece, she became celebrated as the most expert enchantress of an- 
tiquity. It was by a clever but diabolical trick in Pyrotechnics she de- 
stroyed Creusa, while, further to be revenged on her unfaithful husband, 
she contrived to set his palace in flames and then disappeared in a cha- 
riot drawn by winged dragons ! — probably some startling pyrotechnic 
device learned from the magicians at her father's court, and under the 
cover of which she withdrew ; unless we are to suppose she was blown 
up by the explosion of one of her own caldrons or compounds. 

There is no improbability in the supposition that attempts at flying 
were somewhat frequent in remote ages, and that jugglers and artists, 
like Daedalus, did then, as in subsequent times, get up exhibitions of the 
kind ; but, be this as it might, it may be taken for granted that so expert a 
pyrotechnist as Medea, was at no loss in sending up a chariot with an 
artificial representation of herself, on the same principle as such things 
have been done from time immemorial in India and among the Chinese. 
They were common a few centuries ago in Europe. Like most old 
writers on fire-works, John Bate gives directions how to make " fire- 
drakes " and " flying-dragons." The latter were to be constructed of 
ribs of light and dry wood, or with whalebone " covered with muscovie 
glasse and painted." They were to be filled with " petrars," — fiery ser- 
pents were attached to their wings, which were arranged to shake when 
the monster moved. A sparkling composition was to burn at the mouths 
and tails, and one or two large rockets were to be attached, " according 
to the bignesse and weight of each dragon." The trick of Simon Magus, 
in presence of Claudian or Nero, was perhaps allied to that by which 
the Colchian enchantress astounded her adopted countrymen. Giving 
out that he would prove his divinity, or his alliance with the gods, by 
flying, he appeared at the appointed time, as the story says, on the top 
of a high tower, whence he flung himself, (or an artificial substitute,) 
and floated for some time in the air, supported by demons or dragons. 
The latter no doubt as real as the huge scarabeus which Dr. John Dee, 
state-conjurer to Elizabeth, made, and which flew off with a man on its 
back, and took a basket of provisions for the journey. 

Oriental literature is laden with aerial exploits of this nature — of en* 



Ancient and Modern Jugglers. — Medea and the Dragon. 591 

chanters, who like Medea, or Urganda in Amadis de Gaul, transported 
men through the air on artificial serpents and dragons, and of conflicts be- 
tween knights and monsters. But for the loss of those volumes on " cu- 
rious arts," — the pile of magical books burnt at Ephesus — (Acts, xix. 19.) 
.many an ancient and modem prodigy might have been explained. We 
know with what ardor marvellous tricks and stories were devised and 
concocted in the middle ages, and with what avidity gaping multitudes 
received them. Even at this very day similar tricks are played off suc- 
cessfully by monks to unsuspicious congregations. Is it any wonder, 
then, to find pagan boors in Roman tiroes, and others in the darkest of 
mythic epochs, dupes to expert jugglers 1 We may regret the infatuation 
of remote ages, but we should not forget how, in comparatively late 
days, traditions arose and swelled in wonder as years rolled over them, 
and how mechanical devices, simple in themselves, but not comprehend- 
ed by the public, were metamorphosed into supernatural productions, 
which increased in mystery and magnitude as the times when they were 
contemplated receded from those of their birth. Had printing not been 
introduced we might have competed with the ancients in prodigies, and 
prodigies as fully believed ; for there are few old examples derived 
from tangible mechanism, or pure phantasma, that have not been 
imitated by modern manufacturers. But alas for these ! the revival of 
letters is the bane of their fame. Stopped of their borrowed garments 
they stand before us as ordinary mortals — a predicament most of their 
predecessors would be in, had we equal facilities to disrobe them. 

The manner of taming the dragon at Colchis is characteristic. It was 
the work of Medea rather than of Jason, accomplished privily, and at 
midnight. Instead of instructing the leader of the Grecian adventurers 
to attack it as he attacked the bovine monsters, armed with his faulchion 
and club — a species of combat that might have alarmed the palace, she 
adopted a process more quiet and equally effective ; in fact, just such an 
one as might have been expected from her. 

" To make the dragon sleep that never slept, 
Whose crest shoots dreadful lustre ; from his jaws 
A triple tire of forked stings he draws, 
With fangs and wings of a prodigious size: 
Such was the guardian of the golden prize. 
Yet him, besprinkled with Lethcean dew, 
The fair enchantress into slumbers threw." [Met. vii.] 

That is, in unadorned prose, she turned or threw on the concealed 
boiler and furnace a shower of cold water ; and thus, without injuring 
the dragon, sent him as effectually to sleep as a steam-engine is without 
steam — the very device which has been recommended to render harm- 
less a boiler when ready to explode. 

The incident mentioned by Apollonius of the dragon hissing so hor- 
ribly and loud, when the two lovers approached, as to cause neighboring 
forests to echo back the sound and make distant people start in their 
dreams, is pure hyperbole : if modified to an ordinary growl it is hardly 
reconcileable with what he just before narrates of the lady being so cau- 
tious of awakening the numerous palace-guards as to escape through 
by-paths barefoot. Sensible of the solecism he in the next breath as- 
cribes the undisturbed repose of iEetes and his family to magic. It 
would however be futile to attempt to extract unadulterated truth in 
every particular from labored fiction, and particularly in dragon history, 
to make out where truth and fable meet, where one begins or the other 



592 The Chimaera. — Cacus. 

ends. Facts woven up in old poetry were like woollen threads in Baby- 
lonian garments — valued in proportion as they were embellished. The 
poet's like the sculptor's or embroiderer's skill was measured by the art 
with which ordinary materials were lost in forms and ornament. Few 
think of aluminous earth while viewing the splendid vase, and none look 
for truth unadorned in works of classic artists. a 



THE CHIMERA. 

The Chimaera destroyed by Bellerophon looks very like another speci- 
men of Eolipilic ingenuity, though represented of course as a living ani- 
mal, agreeably to legendary tradition and poetic license. Homer de- 
scribes it as 

Lion faced, 

With dragon tail, shag bodied as the goat, 

And from his jaws ejecting streams of fire. [11. vi.] 

The most popular of ancient explanations supposes this monster sig- 
nified a burning mountain, whose top, on account of its desolate nature, 
was the resort of lions, [an obvious contradiction] the middle being fruit- 
ful, abounded with goats, the marshy ground at the bottom swarmed 
with serpents, and Bellerophon by cultivating the mountain subdued it ! 
Such is one of the best specimens of classical guessing, and yet both 
mountain and its inhabitants were suppositious — assumed for want of 
better grounds of conjecture. It is observable that old fire-breathing 
monsters are represented as akin to each other: thus the Chimaera, the 
dragon which guarded the golden fruit in the garden of the Hesperides, 
Cerberus and others, were related to Typhon and the rest of the giants — 
as if to intimate their common nature, so that, according to mythology 
itself, if one was an automaton, all, or nearly all, partook of the same 
character. If the mountain supplied the true solution of the Chimaera, it 
should furnish a key to unriddle the rest, but it would be impossible to 
locate volcanoes where fiery dragons were — in gardens, cellars, palaces, 
&c. and still more so to make them travel abroad and rush hither and 
thither in battle. 

How much more reasonable to admit the Chimaera to have been an 
Eolipilic dragon; its description is then natural, its appearance and per- 
formances credible, and its demolition by the great captain consistent. 
Old demi-gods did not acquire their titles by wielding the mattock. 

If the figure No. 289 had a couple more heads and were furnished 
with the caudal terminus of a lizard or cayman, it would form no bad 
representation of the Chimaera. 

CACUS. 

As like causes produce like effects, so in early as in later times dis- 
banded soldiers turned often robbers. Too idle to work, numbers of 
these ruffians lived by private plunder when opportunities ceased for 
sharing public spoils. Not a few of the old heroes belonged to this class, 
and among them was Cacus. The story of this famous thief is an admi- 

a There is a striking likeness in the manners, customs and superstitions of the Col- 
chians, as portrayed by Apollonius Rhodius, and those of the people described bv Saxo 
and Olaus Magnus. It would be a curious fact if fighting and juggling Eolipiles, or 
the knowledge of them, lingered in the regions of the Euxine and Caspian from the 
adventure of the Argonauts to the battles in which the automatons represented in rigs. 
280 and 290 are said to have been employed. It was from Scythia the arts of brass- 
founding and working in metals descended to lower latitudes, according to Pliny. 



Per 'bonification of Eolipiles — Geryon. 593 

rable comment on the state of society in his day, besides furnishing an- 
other specimen of fraud preying on credulity by means of Eolipiles. A 
son of Vulcan, he knew something of machinery and of the wonders, 
honest and dishonest, his father wrought by it. As usual, he occupied a 
caye favorably located for his purposes. 

.... See yon rock that mates the sky, 
About whose feet such heaps of rubbish lie ; 
Such indigested ruin ; bleak and bare, 
How desert now it stands, exposed in air! 
'Twas once a robber's den, enclosed around 
With living stone, and deep beneath the ground 
The monster Cacus, more than half a beast, 
This hold, impervious to the sun, possess'd. [En. viii. Dryden.] 

At the cavern's mouth he had a triple-headed image, which (not its 
owner) belched black clouds and livid fire. It was at length destroyed 
by Hercules, who we have seen had some experience in such matters. 
The success of Cacus in levying contributions from the fields and folds 
of the simple inhabitants of the neighborhood, and on drovers passing 
through it, appears to have been due to the tact by which he made it 
generally believed that he and the monster were one and the same indi- 
vidual : — a common ruse this in such cases, and one by no means pecu- 
liar to mythic epochs. He made his forays in the night, and lay concealed 
during the day. 

The personification of Eolipilic and other images was in keeping with 
their design, and necessary to preserve their influence over the igno- 
rant. As they sustained the characters of gods and demigods, they were 
addressed as such. The practice differs but little from what is now in 
vogue ; fire-engines, mills, ships, guns, &c. have male and female desig- 
nations, are often spoken of as if endowed with spontaneity and pas- 
sions ; but with not half the propriety as androids representing and per- 
forming functions of living beings. Sometimes these are so delineated in 
their appearance, feelings, employments, &c. that no doubt of men being 
intended could arise, were they not at other times associated with attri- 
butes and deformities unknown to humanity. The solution is however 
easy : — The ancients like the moderns gave their names to certain classes 
of devices, and it is descriptions of these which we confound with the' 
persons after whom they were named — the artificial dragon of Cacua 
with that individual. The same cause of misapprehension may take place 
with regard to men and things of our day. What, for example, must peo- 
ple think, some thousands of years hence, of Washington and Franklin, 
if all memorials of them should then be lost except a few statements, ot 
which one described them as floating monsters, 300 feet in length, with 
scores of brazen mouths through which they vomited floods of fire and 
roared so loud as to make mountains quake : — or according to another 
they were of less majestic size, but showering volumes of smoke from 
iron throats, trembling with passion when obstructed in their progress, 
and then starting forward, gasping and galloping over the ground with 
almost lightning speed, and leaving trains of fire behind ! Land and wa- 
ter dragons ! What could such people think unless informed that 74 gun- 
ships and locomotive carriages often bore the christian names and sur« 
names of those celebrated men. 



GERYON. 

Geryon, another demigod, resembled Cacus in appearance but not in 
circumstances and condition, for he was a prince, and rich in flocks and 

38 



594 Hercules. — Primitive prevalence of Robbery. 

herds, and to guard them had a dog with two heads and a dragon with 
seven ; both of which were overcome by Hercules, who also slew their 
owner and seized the cattle as his rightful spoil. This Quixote of mytho- 
logy travelled in quest of strange adventures, and enriched himself, as 
all heroes did and do, by rapine. In his time, as in Job's, wealth consist- 
ed principally in cattle ; and cattle stealing was, as in subsequent times, 
not held dishonorable — except when unsuccessful. Gods and demigods 
followed and acquired fame by the profession. Of primitive moss-troop- 
ers none equalled Mercury and Hercules in cunning ; it was therefore a 
sad mistake in Cacus to seize eight of Geryon's kine while in the posses- 
sion of such a bold and knowing drover as Alcides. Though he succeeded 
in getting them unperceived into his den, his fire-spitting image had no 
fears for the enraged loser, who was too familiar with such things to 
dread them. 

This primitive prevalence of robbery sufficiently accounts for the 
adoption of secret and extraordinary devices to scare night thieves from 
folds and dwellings of the rich ; and sure we are that modern ingenuity 
might be taxed in vain to produce one better adapted to terrify the igno- 
rant and keep the dishonest at bay, in dark and grossly-superstitious times, 
than flame-ejecting Eolipiles. On the approach of a thief, the concealed 
attendant had only to open a cock to send a scorching blast on the offend- 
er, or the latter might himself unconsciously be made to open it by his 
weight — a species of contrivance perfectly, in character with the genius 
and acknowledged productions of ancient artists. Vulcan was full of such 
conceits. Even now a grim-looking image of the kind would excite no 
little horror among stupid burglars, while it would strike savages dumb. 

The word Geryon, according to some paleologists, signified thunder- 
bolts, and was allusive to the hissing, piercing, overwhelming and scorch- 
ing blasts which issued from the dog and dragon, or from a triple-bodied 
monster called Geryon : not a slight intimation this of their Eolipilic 
nature. In fact, to consider them as figurative creations, and the rest of 
the characters and objects real, is inconsistent ; unless it be conceded 
that Geryon's cows were kept from thieves by metaphors, and that these 
were hacked and shattered by material clubs and faulchions. It would 
have required some flaming similes to frighten experienced cattle-lifters 
like Cacus and Autolycus from their destined prey, or to induce them to 
yield up acquired spoils. 

To resolve these "brazen" monsters into mere creations of the brain, 
appears to us as reasonable as to explain away in like manner metalline 
automata of the Bible — representing them as having had no connection 
with the crucible, but simple abstractions : the serpent, for example, as 
emblematical of the cunning of Moses, and the calf of stupidity in the 
people. By the same process, we might interpret the "bronze" vessel 
or statue in which Eurystheus concealed himself from Hercules into an 
imaginary symbol of excessive fear ; and so with the brazen bull of 
Phalaris and horse of Aruntius, in which human victims were consumed, 
and their shrieks made to resemble the bellowing of oxen, by reverbera- 
ting through interior tubes : a device probably as old as Amalekitish 
artists^ and even older. The calf or heifer cast by the Israelites in the 
wilderness "lowed," according to the Koran. (Chap, vii.) 

No one can doubt the ability of workmen ancient as Vulcan and the 
Cyclops to produce machinery of the kind. If one fact be more prominent 
than another in the earliest records, sacred and profane, it is the perfec- 
tion to which brass-founding had arrived, and the amazing extent to 



Primitive Brass-Founding. — Cerberus. 595 

which metallic imagery was earned. This was a natural result of idol- 
atry. Superstition was the nurse of these arts ; the keenest intellects and 
finest workmen were engaged in them. The grand distinction between 
the useful professions of past and present times, is not due to any differ- 
ence in capacity or skill, but to the estimation in which the arts were and 
are held. The ancients were ignorant of their destined influence on 
human happiness and glory, and therefore only such branches were pa- 
tronized as strengthened the hold of chief priests and rulers on the mul- 
titude. 



CERBERUS. 

It is said of Hercules that he went about subduing the powerful, re- 
lieving the oppressed, and exposing fraud ; but when occasions required 
he obviously acted the juggler himself. The last and greatest of his 
twelve labors — his Cerberean adventure — bears on every feature traces 
of trick. He here employs the very device which Cacus, Geryon, ^Eetes 
and others had found so successful. To play it off well would establish his 
fame over all competitors. Having destroyed every earthly dragon he had 
heard of, he undertakes to wind up his achievements in that line by prov- 
ing his prowess upon the one which guarded the gates of hell. It was 
therefore given out that he was about to bring up Cerberus to light and 
exhibit him to mortal view. This would eclipse all other dragon transac- 
tions, and this he accomplished ! Is it asked how ] Why, by entering a 
"dark cavern" on Mount Taenarus, and after a while dragging to its 
mouth a three-headed dog — an Eolipilic automaton ! As the exhibition 
was of course made in the night, the affrighted spectators, and all not in 
the secret, could not doubt, at the distance they stood, the presence of the 
canine guardian of Tartarus ; its eyes glaring witli living fire, smoke pour- 
ing from its jaws, its movements and the noise it made, would more than 
ensure conviction. The public part of the performance being over, the 
exhibiter, agreeably to promise, instantly set about (no doubt to the grati- 
fication of the audience and particularly of Eurystheus) to remove the 
monster to its own domicile. There is no room to doubt this — he certainly 
pulled it back to the place whence he drew it forth, and none were so bold 
as to follow and see how he succeeded. Probably not one of the beholders 
but would rather his hands and feet had changed places than have ven- 
tured within the cave on this occasion. 

We can form a pretty accurate idea of the sonorous "roarings," the 
" hissings," and " variegated yells" of mythic monsters, by similar sounds 
produced when steam is blown off, through various formed orifices, from 
modern Eohpiles. 

A distinction is observable in the characters and applications of fire- 
vomiting images. Those which represented gods or warriors partook 
more or less of the human figure, while such as guarded enclosures for 
cattle, habitations, and places where riches were kept, put on forms 
compounded of dogs, serpents, lizards, bats, &c. i. e. were dragons — an 
idea derived from the employment of household mastiffs and shepherd 
curs. (A beautiful illustration of the practice of protecting houses is 
seen on entering the vestibule of " The house ,)f the Tragic poet" at 
Pompeii. On the mosaic pavement is lively represented a fierce and 
full-sized dog, collared and chained, in the act of barking, and ready to 
spring upon the intruder. At his feet is the caution, in legible letters, 
cave canem, beware of the dog.) Griffins, or dragons, says Pliny, form- 
erly guarded gold mines, and in old illustrated works some queer-look- 



596 Gold Mines guarded by Dragons. — Origin of Tartarus. 

ing nondescripts are seen performing that duty. The sentiment was 
once universally received ; it still has believers in benighted parts of 
Europe, and over a great part of the East. It was encouraged by inte- 
rested individuals to keep timid thieves at a distance. Ridiculous as it 
appears, it accords with every other occupation of dragons. Why not 
protect rich mines as well as a few pounds of metal % The story or the 
fact gave rise to the fable of Cerberus ; for Tartarus, its occupants and 
their occupations were all derived from earthly, tangible types. 

Pluto was an extensive mining proprietor, Tartarus his subterranean 
domains ; its fires his furnaces. Demons were felons condemned " to the 
mines," where, naked and in " chains," some toiled in darkness, and were 
urged to unnatural exertions by the lashes of inexorable overseers ; 
others, ghastly from inhaling the poisonous fumes, appeared still more so 
in the glare of sulphurous fires, in which they roasted and smelted the 
ores. Their punishment was endless, their sentence irrevocable ; they 
had no hopes of pardon and no chance of escape. Cerberus freely per- 
mitted all to enter the gate, but not one to pass out. There were no 
periods of cessation from labor ; their fires never went out ; both night 
and day the smoke of their torments ascended ; groans never ceased to 
be heard, nor the rattling of chains and shrieks of despair. Acheron, 
Cocytus and Styx were subterranean streams, each possessing some pe 
culiar feature or property, while near Phlegethon arose a stream of car- 
buretted hydrogen, a phenomenon not uncommon on the earth's surface, 
but often occurring in mines. Such is the most probable exposition of 
the origin of Tartarus. From what else, indeed, could the heathen 
have derived the idea at epochs anterior to Scripture descriptions of 
hell, and before prophets or apostles flourished 1 We know that the an- 
cients sent their worst felons to the mines, and that these places pre- 
sented the most vivid representations of severe and ceaseless punishment 
which the earth affords. The greater part of the convicts ere they en- 
tered these dreary regions took their last look of the sun. With shud- 
dering horror, pale, and eyes aghast, they viewed their lamentable fate. 
Milton's description of hell was literally true of ancient mines and sub- 
terranean smelting furnaces. 

" A dungeon horrible, on all sides around 
As one great furnace flam'd, yet from those flames 
No light, but rather darkness visible 
Serv'd only to discover sights of wo ; 
Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace 
And rest can never dwell, hope never comes 
That comes to all ; but torture without end 
Still urges, and a fiery deluge, fed 
With ever-burning sulphur unconsumed." 

Does the reader think the picture too highly colored for mortal per- 
dition 1 Why, it lacks a modern trait, one more revolting than the 
ancients ever imagined. Boys and girls from six to ten years and up- 
wards, born and bred in coal-pits, less knowing than brutes, and incom- 
parably worse cared for, are, or were recently, wholly employed in drag- 
ging and pushing on all fours, and perfectly denuded, laden sledges 
through dark, broken, wet and tortuous passages or sewers to the pit's 
mouth ! And this too in a christian and enlightened land, where no 
small pait of the people's earnings are consumed by an opulent hie- 
rarchy ! Is it possible for hell itself so effectually to efface God's 
image, or to heap such accumulated woes on infant and unoffending vie* 
tims 1 Pluto and his myrmidons would have quaked with passion at the 



Sulphurous Fires in Tartarus. 597 

bare proposal of such a scheme ; yet it, and other evils scarcely less 
sickening and vile, have their defenders among those who worship the 
molochs of monarchy and mammon. Heaven help the oppressed of this 
earth — the creators but not partakers of its wealth — who industriously 
toil, and through excessive penury prematurely die — urged to produce 
a maximum amount of work with a minimum of rest and food — who 
with their offspring groan in hopeless misery here, and are threatened 
with endless torments in another life if they remain not satisfied " in 
that station into which," some reverend and blaspheming despots say 
" it hath pleased God to call them !" 

The reason why sulphur figured so largely in descriptions of Tar- 
tarus must be apparent to all conversant with mining and metallurgical 
operations. It is the earth's internal fuel, the most profuse of subterra- 
nean inflammable substances. It pervades most mineral bodies ; and not 
minerals alone, but in metalliferous ores it wonderfully abounds. All the 
principal ores of commerce are sulphurets; iron, silver, copper, tin, 
lead, zinc, &c. Of these some contain 15, and others 50 per cent, and 
upwards of sulphur, to get rid of which constitutes the chief difficulty in 
their reduction. In order to this they are " roasted " at a low red heat 
for six, twelve, twenty, and some for thirty hours, that the sulphur may 
be volatilized, and not till its blue flames cease is the signal realized to in- 
crease the heat and fuse the metal. Thus, for every ton of the latter, half 
a ton, and often a whole ton of the former has to be driven off in flames 
and vapor ; so that it was with strict propriety said that Pluto's fires 
were fed with it. Comparatively speaking, they consisted of little 
else, and little else was felt or seen. It impregnated every object, while 
from its offensive odor and suffocating fumes none could escape. Im- 
mense quantities of common brimstone are obtained by collecting and 
condensing the vapors that ascend from smelting furnaces ; and it may 
have been this, or a native mass, which formed the throne or usual seat 
of the lord of the lower regions. As long as the earth endures, volcanos 
burn, and minerals are reduced, there will be, as in PJuto's time, arti- 
ficial as well as natural fires of ever-burning sulphur. 

There are passages in Maundeville's Travels corroborative of Carpini's 
images and Pliny's Griffins. He speaks of artists in northern Asia as 
wonderfully expert in automatical contrivances — " fulle of cauteles and 
sotylle disceytes" making " bestes and bryddes, that songen full delecta- 
bely, and meveden be craft, that it semede thei weren quyke." In his 
28 Cap. he describes a valley rich in gold and silver, (in the " lordchippe 
of Prester John,") but it abounded with devils, and few men who ventured 
there for treasure returned. This was the story, and we need not say 
how like a primitive artifice to scare people from intruding. " And in 
mydde place of that vale, undir a roclie, is an hed and the visage of a 
devyl bodyliche, fulle horrible and dreadfulle to see, and it schewethe 
not but the hed to the schuldres. But there is no man in the world so 
hardy, Cristene man ne other, but that he wold ben a drad for to behold 
it ; and that it wolde semen him to dye for drede, so hideouse is it for 
to beholde. For he beholdethe every man so scharpley, with dredfulle 
eyen that ben evere more movynge and sparklynge as fuyr, and chaung- 
ethe and sterethe so often in dyverse manere, with so horrible counte- 
nance, that no man dar not neighen [approach] towardes him. And fro 
him comethe smoke and stynk and fuyr, and so much abhomynacioun, that 
unethe no man may there endure." This was one of the tricks which 
the traveller could not tell, whether it was done " by craft or by negro* 



598 Dragons. — Chinese Festivals. 



5' 



maneye." From automata he saw in the country belonging to Prester 
John's father-in-law, [China] he was led to conclude that artists there 
surpassed all men under heaven for deceptive inventions. 

That devices like the one just described, or similar to the brazen 
horses of Regnerus, were in vogue in the East, in Maundeville's time, ap- 
pears from Marco Paulo, who mentions magic contrivances for darken- 
ing the air with clouds of smoke, &c. in use by the military, and under 
cover of which many were slain. Marco himself was once in danger of 
his life on such an occasion : he escaped, but several of his associates 
were cut off. 



D RAGO N S. 

Had not ideas of fire-spouting nondescripts been exceedingly ancient 
they had never become so intimately and universally mixed up with 
human affairs. Throughout the old world the dragon was the ne plus 
ultra of impersonations of the horrible — the king of monsters. It is so 
now, and a more appalling one, or one invested with more terrific quali- 
ties cannot be devised. So deeply was its image impressed on ancient 
minds that it pervaded history, song, and all religions. We meet with it 
in the Scriptures as well as in the classics. The devil, from his reputed 
connection with smoke and liquid fire, is named "the great dragon." In 
old religious processions, and in the "mysteries" or dramatic represen- 
tations of the church, Satan was symbolized by an image of a dragon 
spitting fire. The author of the apocalypse seems to allude to mythic 
fire-breathing images in the following passage. " If any man will hurt 
them, fire proceedeth out of their mouths and devoureth their enemies." a 

The universal custom of exhibiting figures of dragons in ecclesias- 
tical and civic pomps was a mythic relic — a practice continued from 
times when captured idols and warring Eolipiles were led in triumph. 
Then, objects of superstitious dread, they now amused spectators : at 
the coronation of Anne Bulleyn, a " foyste " or galley preceded the 
lord mayor's barge; "in which foyste was a great red dragon, continu- 
ally moving and casting forth wild fire : and round about the said foyste 
stood terrible*, monstrous and wilde men, casting fire and making a hide- 
ous noise." If the truth could be known, there would be found little dif- 
ference between this modern monster and some of its ancient namesakes. 

No chimerical being was ever so celebrated as the dragon. To it 
temples were dedicated, of which some remained in classical eras. The 
practice is continued in China. Of an official dignitary it is said, ere he 
entered on the duties of his office (at Canton,) he one morning paid his 
devotions at eight temples, of which one was consecrated to the god of 
fire, another to the god of wind, and a third to the dragon or dragon- 
king. "The festival of the dragon-boats" is another relic of times when 
these artificial monsters were in vogue. [Chinese Rep. iii. 95, 47.] The 
legends of China and Japan teem with dragon allegories and apologues. 
The figure is an imperial emblem, and as such is wrought on robes, 
painted on porcelain, carved on dwellings, ships, furniture and other 

tt In Scandinavian and ancient British history, and throughout northern Asia and 
Europe, the dragon was 'he universal minister of vengeance. It was eventually made 
typical of all destructive agents — of water ;is well as fire. It became a symbol of the 
deluge, on which account figures of it pouring water from the mouth were adopted in 
ancient fountains. Some ot these have been noticed in this volume. May not St. 
John have had one in view when he wrote " And the dragon cast out of his mouth 
water as a flood." [Rev. xii. 13-27.] 



Dragons with many Heads. — Dedicated to Minerva. 599 

works of art. No people retain so many characteristics of times when 
Eolipilic monsters flourished. They act on the same principle as old 
warriors did, by trying to frighten their enemies with warlike scare- 
crows, with pompous orders — assuming the language of gods and ad- 
dressing other people as devils, dogs and reptiles. Their taste for the 
horrible extends to civil life; things of the wildest forms which imagi- 
nation can furnish or nature reveal are most highly prized. 

As a guardian of temples, sacred groves and treasures, the celebrity 
of the dragon has continued to present times. Enforcing a principle in 
ancient ethics, it kept the ignorant honest by frightening them. But when 
it lost this magic power, and enchanted chambers could no longer be 
relied on, eastern monarchs sought out natural monsters to guard their 
precious stones and living jewels. Deformed negroes; the most hideous 
of nature's abortions, are now the sentinels of eastern treasuries and 
seraglios. 

Mythic dragons had commonly a multiplicity of heads. This was in 
keeping with their design and with the taste of the times. Each addi- 
tional member adding horror to their appearance and furnishing in the 
mouth and eyes additional orifices for the issuing flames ; like fire-en- 
gines that eject several streams. The device is very analagous to others 
common in old war-engines. The idea was adopted by the author of the 
most figurative book of the Scriptures. He speaks of " a great red dra- 
gon with seven heads and ten horns." The figure No. 288 it will be 
seen has one horn. Most of the idols of the Hindoos, and of the orientals 
generally, have numerous heads, and some have horns. By dragons in 
the Bible, crocodiles, or large serpents, are commonly intended, but 
chimerical or mythic beings are obviously intended in such passages as 
the one above quoted. 

Another characteristic in dragon biography, attributed to rather mo- 
dern individuals, was an undoubted trait in the patriarchs of the species. 
When one was overcome without being demolished, it was generally led 
in triumph, in the manner of Theseus showing off the Marathonian bull 
in the streets of Athens — or of Saint Romain leading with his stole a 
fierce dragon to the market-place at Rouen — the victor receiving the con- 
gratulations of his countrymen on his prowess, and the prisoner behav 
ing the while, as well behaved prisoners should — i. e. silently submit- 
ting to the will of the captors. Suppose the dragon figured at No. 289, 
exhausted of its contents, (in battle it would often require fresh charging,) 
its movements put a stop to, and in that condition captured ; what fol- 
lows, but that the victors put one end of a rope round its neck and the 
other in their hands ; and have we not then a perfect representation of a 
fiery monster becoming harmless as a lamb and tamely submitting to be 
led about, as ancient chronicles have it, " like a meke beaste and de- 
bonayre." 

But the dragon was dedicated to Minerva ; and to whom else could 
it have been so appropriately devoted % One might almost fancy she 
mounted this popular form of the Eolipile on her cap as a compliment 
to old artists. Certainly if the patroness of the useful arts had now to 
Belect an expressive symbol of her best gift to mortals, she would adopt 
the same thing in its modern shape — a miniature engine and boiler. 
This she would consider, like Worcester, her " crowning" device. But 
it is perhaps said, the ornament on her crest was an emblem of war. 
Well, was not that the chief use to which Eolipilic dragons were put I 
Then was she not so familiar with artificial lightning and thunJer as to 



600 Analogies between ancient and modern Eolipiles. 

nave rivalled her father in hurling them at will on her foes. She took 
part in the wars of the giants, and destroyed not the least of the kindred 
of Typhon herself. Another circumstance indicative of her acquaintance 
with Eolipilic contrivances is the fact, (noticed on a previous page,) of 
her image at Troy having the faculty of sending flames from its eyes. 

It were easy thus to proceed and point out the artificial character of 
most of the imaginary monsters of antiquity — to render in a high degree 
probable, that, like acknowledged androidal and automatal productions 
of Vulcan, Daedalus, Icarus, Perillus, and other artists named by Pliny in 
his 34th Book, they were originally mechanical, pyrotechnical or eolipilic 
images ; sometimes combining two or more and occasionally other ele- 
ments in their functions and movements ; that the faculty of locomotion 
attributed to some accorded not only with applications of modern me- 
chanism, but with avowed artificial contrivances of ancient artists, and 
that their material natures were, in after times, construed into the ideal, 
either from ignorance or by the imagination of poets — but this is unne- 
cessary. Enough has been said to induce the reader to pursue the sub- 
ject, or to reject the hypothesis as untenable. The antiquity of Eolipiles 
is unquestionable. Their origin is lost in remote time. We know they 
were made in fantastic and frightful forms, were used as idols, designed 
to spout fluids and eject fire — the very attributes ascribed to mythic 
monsters. Is it unreasonable then to suppose the latter had no existence 
except as Eolipiles ] But if it be contended they were wholly figurative, 
from what were the conceptions derived, if Eolipiles were not the things 
they symbolized ; and how account for coincidences which nothing else 
in nature or in art can produce 1 One observation more, and we 
conclude : — 

Early applications of Eolipiles and their present employment as steam 
boilers, suggest some interesting analogies. Emblems of half civilized 
times and races, they connect the remote past with the present. Ordain- 
ed as it were to move in advance of the arts and astonish mankind, they 
have lost none of their virtue. If their ancient vagaries shook commu- 
nities with alarm, their current deeds are eliciting the world's admira- 
tion. They furnished tradition with marvellous stories, and modern his- 
tory is engaged in recording their wonders. They supplied materials for 
the earliest and worst chapters in the earth's annals ; to them and their 
effects will be devoted some of the latest and best. Formerly they feebly 
personated Gods ; now, the sole animators of our grand motive engines, 
they annihilate time and space by their movements and laugh at all phy- 
sical resistance. Children watch their operations with ecstacy and old 
men hardly believe what they see. Once an instrument of the worst 
of tyrannies, the Eolipile is becoming the most effectual agent in the ex- 
tinction of tyrants. Instead of acting, as of yore, on human fears ; debasing 
the mind and furthering the views of oppressors, it captivates the judg- 
ment of the wisest, elevates nations in morals, and confers on them 
wealth and extended domain. The gem of old miracle-mongers, it is the 
staple device of living magicians, for its present improvers and users are 
the genuine representatives of Pharaonic Savans and mythologic Magi. 

New York, July, 1845. 

THE END. 



INDEX. 



Abacus, 430 

Achelous and Hercules, fable of explained, 
120 

Adam, traditions of, 12 

Adventures of a bottle, 478 

iEschylus, singular death of, 365 

Agricola, quoted, 69, 72, 117, 126, 151, 219, 
240, 278, 315 

Agriculture, 79, 118. Implements of, 12,132 

Air, its properties, 176 — 186. Ancient expe- 
riments on, 192. Rarefaction by heat, 374 — 
380. Liquids raised by currents of, 224-5, 
447, 473 

Air-barometer, 1SS, 375 

beds, 177. Guns, 181, 192, 270, 425 

chambers to pumps, 265, 269, 270, 306, 

307, 326, 337, 338, 371 

machines, 374—380, 447, 473 

— pumps, 179, 180, 190, 403, 426 

Air and steam, their supposed identity, 395 — 
400,418,420,421,572 

Ajutages, conical, effect of, 479, 480, 486 — 
488, 490—496 

Albertus, 104 

Alchemists, 395, 407, 40S 

Alcithge ; taken off by priests, 385 

Alcoholic engines, 441, 472 

Aleppo, water-wheels at, 115 

Alexandria, library at, 415. Wells at, 54, 55 

Alfred the Great, measured time by candles, 
350 

Algerines, their superstitions, 36 

Altars, 107. Tricks at, 3S3— 385 

Alum, used to make wood incombustible, 304 

America, ancient arts in, 159 — 172 

American water- works, 298 — 301. Fire-en- 
gines, 339—348. Wells, 50, 160, 164, 298 

Amontons, his fire-mill, 463 

Androids and automata, 104, 183, 294, 534, 
568, 573 

Anecdotes, of Mahomet, 10. Dentatus, 19. 
Darius, 22. Egyptian priests, 22. Two 
elephants, 39. A boy and goose 39. Alex- 
ander, 39. A caliph, 42. Cleanthes, 56. 
An ass, 74. An Indian Cacique, 107. Ctesi- 
bius, 121, 122. Valentinian, 196. A raven, 
203. A Spanish pump-maker, 224. A 
Basha, 316. A Dutch Burgher, 366. Lord 
Bacon, 375. Marquis of Worcester, 392. 
Zeno, 393. Cromwell, 442. Savery, 454. 
Phocion, 537, 565. Oxen, 573 

Angelo, M. 534 



Anglo-Saxons, worshiped wells, 36. Homily, 
ibid. Buckets, 67. Mirrors, 121. Swape, 
99. Windlass, 72. Steam idols, 398 

Animals, employed to raise water, 74, 117, 
573. Devices of, 365. Their physiology 
illustrated, 180,181, 209,210,256—258 

Anthemius and Zeno, 393 

Antipater, 282 

Antlia of the Greeks, 213 

Anvil, blacksmith's, 12, 43, 240, 241 

Aquarius, 85 

Arabs, 41 

Arago, 145,411,433 

Archimedes, 141,360,438 

Archytas, 7, 268 

Argand's siphon, 525 

Arkwright, 359 

Arts, useful, their origin, &c. 2, 6, 11, 12, 81, 
S3, 232, 282 

Artificial hands and feet, 4 

Atabalipa, 169 

Astronomy, 85 

Aqueducts, 165—169,212 

Auto da Fe, 351 

Awls, 87, 489 

Atmosphere, its properties, 176—189. Dis- 
covery of its pressure, 187,425,426. Its 
pressure diminished during storms, 481. 
By currents of air, 4S2-S. By currents of 
steam, 4S9 — 496. By currents of water, 
479 ' 

Atmospheric pumps, 173, 175, 187—191,206 
—230 

- sprinkling pots, 194, 195, 567, 



573 



B. 



Babylon, 79. Hydraulic engine at, 133, 303 
Bacchus, tricks at his temples, 200, 385 
Bacon, Roger, 403 

Lord, 416-17, 550 

Balls supported on jets of air, steam, and 

water, 270, 395 
Barbers, 121, 162. See preface. 
Barometer, 190, 375, 481 
Basket, swinging, for raising water, 85,86 
Bate, John, 321, 375,421, 565, 568, 569 
Baths, 120, 147, 169, 393. 552, 558 
Bears employed in tread-wheels, 74 
Beer, S7 
Bees, 257, 276 

Beds, air and water, 177, 17S. Bedcloths, 178 
Bedsteads, 87, 178, brazen feet. See pre/ace 



602 



INDEX. 



Bel and the Dragon, 519 

Bellona, 30S 

Bells used as fire-engines, 313, 314. Bellmen, 
315 

Bellows, S7,90, 177, ISO, 232— 243, 261, 26S, 
483. Origin of the word, 570. Vulcan's 
233, 240, 268, 56S. African, 235, 246,252. 
Asiatic, 236. Egyptian, 237,238. Mada- 
gascar, 246, 252. Lantern, 240, 241. Rotary, 
252, 255 

piston, 244 — 252. Philosophical, 

396, 397, 569, 570 

pumps, 205, 210, 235, 241, 243, 568 

Belt, hydraulic, 137 

Belzoni, 124 

Berenice's hair, 143 

Besson's Theatre, quoted, 69, 114, 126, 152, 
218, 280, 317, 410 

Bethlehem, well at, 48 

Bible quoted or illustrated, 2, 10, 11, 19, 22, 
24, 26, 30, 31 , 33, 35, 38, 40, 44, 51 , 52, 84, S7, 
90,95, 117, 132, 195,292,283,291,303,366, 
391, 393, 400, 476, 517, 536, 560, 565, 571 

Birmah, raising water in, 73 

Blacksmiths, Adam one, 12. Vulcan, 240. 
Grecian, 241. See preface. 

Blakey, 462 

Blood, circulation of, 132,257 

Blow-pipes, 19, 234, 569. Eolipilic, 569 

Blowing tubes, Ewbank's, 484—496 

siphons, Ewbank's, 527, 528 

Boa Constrictor, ISO 

Boats, steam and others, 258, 403, 419, 423, 
438 

Boilers, of wood and of granite, 470. Heated 
by the sun, 471 

ancient, 392, 393, 522. Of coiled tubes, 

394 

Branca, 41S 

Buckets, 32,52, 54, 63, 73, S3, 167, 171, 302, 
314, 315, 340, 341. War caused by one, 67, 
Ancient metallic ones, 230 

Bucket engines, 64—66, J28. Ancient, 573 

Burckhardt at Petra, 42. At Hamath, 116 



Calabash, 14, 16 

Caenbyses, 377 

Camera Obscura, 379, 403, 430 

Candles, time measured by, 350 

Canne hydraulique, 372, 373 

Canopus, origin of these vessels, 23 

Capillary attraction, 510, 513 

Cardan, 396, 407, 410 

Carpenter's tools and work, 87 

Carthagenian wells, 27, 38 

Cast iron, 26S, 553 

Cato the Censor, 536 

Cauldrons, 19—21, 120, 162, 171, 237, 238, 

391,394 
Caus. See Decaus. 
Cawley,-464, 468 
Cecil's motive engine, 473 
Cement, 58 

Centrifugal pumps, 229, 230, 290, 291 
Chains, golden, 162. Watch, 323 
Chain of pots machine, 122 — 132 
Chain-pumps, 14S — 158, 567. In ships, 154 — 

157, 567 
Chain and sector, 467 
Chairs, imprisoning, 29, 573. Cane, 323 
Chemists' siphons, 526 
Chemnitz pressure engine, 362 
Child's rattle, inventor of, 268 
Chili, aqueducts in ; 165 
Chimneys increasing the draft of, 395, 482, 

4S3. 4SS 



Chinese tinker, 20, 248. Juggler, 199. Wells, 
28, 30, 35, S3. Proverbs, 30, 31. Printing; 
Windlass, &c. 69, 70. Irrigation, 82, S3, 
86. Noria, 112. Chain-pump, 150. Ships, 
158. Bellows, 248. Digesters, 393. Clocks, 
545 

Chisels of gold, and faced with iron, 5 

Chuck, eccentric, 285 

Churches, fountains in, recommended, 540 

Circulation of the blood, 132, 257 

Cisterns, 4S, 5S, 169, 170, 557 

Cistern pole, 57 

Cleanthes, 56 

Clepsydrae, 55, 542— 7 

Clocks and watches, 122, 285,323. Substi- 
tutes for, 350 

Clysters, 260 

Coach with portable kitchen, 445 

Coal-pits, raising water from, by fire, 419 

Cocks, of gold, silver, &c. 170, 559, 560. 
Three and four way, 354, 355, 421 , 433, 449, 
462, 523. Ancient, 394, 557, 559. Guage, 
459. Siphon, 527. Sliding, 561 

Coffins of iron and lead, 551 

Cog-wheels, 71, 72, 114, 121. Engine for 
cutting teeth, 323 

Cohesion of liquids, 513, 515 

Coining, Roman mode of, 6 

Combs, 87. See preface. 

Condensation of steam by injection discovered 
by chance, 466 

Conon, 143 

Constantinople, water-works at, 43, 553. An- 
cient baths at, 552. Fire-engines at, 316 

Constellations, 143 

Cooking by steam, 471 

Cord and bucket for raising water, 53 — 56 

Cornucopia, 119, 120 

Cortez, 159—163 

Coryatt, 78 

Cotton gin, 359 

Coupling screws, 326, 459 

Couvre feu, 350 

Crassus, bad practice of his, 311 

Crates, saving of his about war, 309 

Creusa, 3S3 

Crucibles, Egvptian, S7, 234 

Crusaders, 32, 372 

Cupelo furnaces, 397 

Cupping, 202, 203 > 

Curfew bell, 350 

Ctesibius, 121, 122, 192,213,259, 266—270, 
547 

D 

Daedalus, inventions ascribed to him, 268 

Damasking linen, 323 

Danaus, carried pumps to Greece, 130 

Darius, anecdote of, 22 

Decaus, 319, 380, 410—13, 529, 533 

Delphic oracle, 241, 392 

Democritus, saying of his, 57 

Demons, superstitions respecting, 31 3,4S2, 521 

Demosthenes, his father a cutler, 6 

De Moura's steam-engine, 463 

Dentatus, anecdote of, 19 

Desaguliers, his bucket-engines, 63, 66. Re- 
marks on Savery,460. Steam-engine, 461 

Dials, 542 

Digesters, 392, 393, 446, 447 

Discoveries in the arts, way to make, 359 

Diogenes, buried heels up, 36 

Distaff and spindle, 283 

Distilling, 381,393, 407 

Divination, bv water, 34, 36. With cups, 200. 
201. With "fire, 3S3, 571. Steam, 392, 399 

Diving ships and apparatus, 430, 431 

Dogs in tread wheels, 74, 75 



INDEX. 



603 



Dolls, 87, 268 

Doors and gates, self-moving, 384, 555,556 

Dove-tailing, 87, 268 

Dowry of Scipio's daughter, 121 

Drawing water, imposed as a punishment, 84, 

131,533 
Drebble, C. 188, 323, 381. 430 
Drinking vessels, 4, 11, 14—16, 162, 195, 205, 

520—2 
Drops of liquid, 511 
Dropping tubes, 199 
Dunstan, St. 104, 105. Adroit trick of his, 

107 
Dutch scoop, 93. Fire-engines and hose, 328, 

329. Inventions. See preface. 
Dwellings, heated by steam, 471. Fountains 

in, recommended, 361, 540 



Ear-trumpets, 379,573 

Ecclesiastes, a fine passage in, illustrated, 
132 

Ecclesiastics, devices of, 103—108, 3S3— 387, 
392 398 400 

Eddystone light-house, 258, 366, 367 

Egypt, labor of, what it was, 86 

Egyptian wells, 26—28. Customs, 34, 78, 
81, S3, 87. Noria, 113. Shadoof, 94, 95. 
Mental, 85. Chainof pots, 123, 131. Screw, 
142. Siphons, 516. Clepsydrae, 544, 547. 
Goldsmiths, 234. Fire-engine, 307 

Emblematic devices. 32, 194, 203,261, 314, 
557 

Endosmosis, 510 

Engines of motion, 419, 423 

Engines to extinguish fires, of great antiquity, 
303. Employed in ancient wars, 303, 305. 
Referred to by Apollodorus, 235, 304. Des- 
cribed and figured by Heron, 305. Portable 
engines, 311. Syringe engine, 315,317,321. 
German, 318, 319, 324, 331. English, 320, 
321, 322, 332—335, 568. French, 324, 325, 
327, 329, 336. Dutch, 32S, 331 . American, 
339, 344, 345. Rotary, 285, 573. Steam 
fire-engines, 338, 346—349 

English, inventions of, 323. See preface. 
Water-works. 294—296 Fire-engines, 320, 
332—335. Steam-engines, 420, 437, 455, 
465 

Eolian harp, 104 

Eolipiles, an emblematic device, 261. From 
Heron's Spiritalia, 394. For blowing fires, 
395 — 400, 573. Increasing draft of chim- 
neys, 395, 401. Diffusing perfumes, 401. 
Producing music, 401. Fusing metals, 397, 
569, 570. In the human form, 398, 399. 
Used in war, 400. Charging, 395, 407, 570 

Eolipilic idols, 398, 400, 570 

Eolus, god of winds, 400 

Ephesus, fountains at, 49 

Epigrams, ancient, 282, 537 

Erckers, blowing eolipiles from, 307, 570 

Evans, Oliver, 424 

Evaporation of water from the earth, 506 

Ewbank's experiments on raising water, 225. 
Mode of propelling vessels, 406. Blowing 
tubes, 484—496. Spouting tubes, 497— 
504. Mode of evaporating liquids in vacuo, 
495. Experiments on the force of sap, 509. 
Increasing the draft of chimneys, 488. Ven- 
iliting ships and mines, 488. Siphons, 527, 
528. Siphon cocks, 527. Tubular valve, 
556. Sliding cocks, 560, 561. Tinned leaden 
pipes, 555 

Explosion of boilers, 392 

Explosive motive engines, 441, 450, 471 — 473 



Faye's La, improved tympanum, 111 

Feast of Cana, siphons used at, 517 

Females, employment of ancient, 283 

Fetters, Lacedemonians bound with their own, 
84. Found on skeletons in Pompeii, 29 

Fire, modes of obtaining it, 197. Sacred, 196, 
197. Superstitions respecting, 312 — 314. 
Protecting buildings from, 304, 349. Greek 
fire, 307. Laws respecting, 351. Raising 
water by, 374—384, 41 S, 419, 431, 442. 
Kindling on altars, 3S3, 384 

Fire-escapes, 350 

Fire-engines, *302— 349, 573 

Firemen, Roman, 309. American, 340 — 345 

Fire-places, 483 

Fish, fishing, 86, 87, 185. Nets, 550. Salt- 
ing fish, 86 

Fitch, John, 424 

Flatterers, among men of science, 143, 145 

Flies, curious mechanism of, 182, 183 

Flying, 103, 104,324,430 

Fly-wheels, 278, 283 

Floats for steam-boilers, 471 

Fludd, Robert, 65, 194, 219, 354, 407 

Forcing pumps, 262 

Forks derived from China, 70. Their use in 
Europe, 76—78 

Fortification, a moveable one, 430 

Fortune, wheel of, 119 

Fountains, 27, 33, 34, 35, 41, 43, 49, 119, 163, 
170. Artificial, 30, 361, 379, 445, 532—541 

Fountain lamps, &c. 193 

Forcing pumps, 262—281 

Francini's bucket machine, 128 

Francois' steam machine, 463 

French inventions. See preface. Water- 
works, 277, 296—298. Fire-engines, 317, 
324—331, 336 

Frictionless pumps, 208, 209, 321, 274, 568. 
See bellows pumps. 

Frogs, climb by atmospheric pressure, 183 

Fuel, in steam idols, 400. Lord Bacon on, 
417 

Fulton, Robert, 359, 464 

Fusee, 71. Fusee windlass, 69 — 71 

Future happiness, erroneous views of, 508 



Gaining and losing buckets,64 — 66, 128 

Galileo, 104, 187, 188 

Games, ancient, 81 

Garcilasso, 167, 170, 509 

Gardens, Egyptian, 101. Babylonian, 134. 
Mexican, 163, 537. Peruvian, 171. Ro- 
man, 536. Italian, 537. Persian, 539, 573 
Floating, 539 

Garden watering pots, 194, 195, 567, 573, 

Garden syringes, 261 

Gates and doors, closed by machinery, 556 

Gauls, 36. Induced to invade Rome by the 
report of a smith, 19 

Geese, in tread wheels, 75 

Genevieve, St. 37 

Gensanne's engine, 463 

Gerbert, 104, 401 

German snail, 138. Bellows pump, 207. Fire, 
engines, 319, 323—326. German inventions. 
See preface. 

Gesner, 381 

Geysers, 411, 507 

Glass, painting on, 4. Engine for working, 
323. Mirrors, 121. Glass tomb of Belus, 
200 

Glass tubes, curious motion of, 429 

Glazier's vise, antiquity of, 554 



604 



INDEX. 



Glauber, device of his, 440. Safety valves 

used by him, 451. Wooden boilers, 470 
Glue, ancient, 87, 
Gnat, the, a boat builder, 258 
Goats employed in tread wheels, 152. Battles 

between, 366 
Goblets for unwelcome guests, 521. Magical, 

520 
Gold-beating, 87 

Golden legend, extract from, 313, 314 
Goose-neck joint, 307, 322, 327, 573. Substi- 
tute for, 324—326 
Gosset's frictionless pump, 208 
Goths employed bears in tread wheels, 74 
Gravity, suspension of objects against, 142 
Greece, wells in, 27, 36. Antiquities found 

in them, 50. Water raised from them by 

the swape, 96 
Greeks, 268 

Green-houses heated by steam, 471 
Guage cocks, 459 
Guage, mercurial, 451 
Guerricke, Otto, 181, 190, 426 
Gulf stream, 477, 47S 
Guns, repeating, 430. Air, 181, 192, 270, 379, 

573. Steam, 395, 423, 573 
Gunpowder, 143, 3S3. Known to Roger 

Bacon, 403. Engines moved by, 441, 450, 

472 
Gutters, for raising water, 88, 91, 92. Spouts 

of, ornamented, 119 

H 

Hair, coloring it practised of old, 120. Bere- 
nice's hair, 143. Pulling up trees by one of 
Sampson's hairs, 418 

Hamath, water- works at, 115, 116 

Hammer, its origin and history, 5, 6 

Hand, used as a cup, 11, 40, 52. Artificial 
hand, 4 

Haskin's quicksilver pump, 274 2P5 

Hautefille, 441 

Heart, the, a pump, 258 

Hegisostratus, wooden foot of, 4 

Helepoles, 304 

Heliopolis, fountain at, 43, 49 

Heliogabalus, 177, 561 

Heraldic devices, 261, 314, 396 

Herculaneum, wells at, 28, 29, 55. Fountains 
at, 534 

Hereward, the Saxon, 36 

Herodotus, quoted, 4, 11, 12, 20, 22, 27, 58, 
79,80,81,84,96, 133,241,260 

Heroes, old mechanics the true, 5 

Heron, 65. His fountain, 361. Air-machines, 
378. Account of his Spiritalia, 385, 386. 
Eolipiles from, 394 

Hieroglyphics, American, 164 

Hindoos, their mode of drinking, 11. Wells, 
30, 33, 35, 38, 52. Carrying water, 84. 
Picotah, 97. Swinging basket, 85. Jantu, 
89, 90. Syringes, 260, 261. Water-clocks, 
544 

Hire La, his double acting pump, 271 

Holy water, derived from the heathen, 166, 
196, 3S6. Ancient vase for selling it, 387. 
Used in consecrating bells, 313, 314, and 
various other articles, 196 

Homer, quoted, 19, 21,22, 33,233, 240, 250, 
536. Kept a school at Scio, 131 

Honors, titles of, absurd origin of some, 144, 
145, 445, 446 

hookah, 270 

Hooke, Dr. 441 

Horn of abundance, 119, 120 

Horn, drinking, saying respecting it, explain- 
ed, 205 



Hour-glasses, 545, 547 

Hose pipes, 304, 326—328, 345 

House warming, 37 

Hudibras,265 

Hurricanes, commence at the leeward, 481 

Huyghens, 441 

Hydraulic belt, 137 

Hydraulic ram, 367—372 

Hydraulic machines, ancient, 7, 10, 81, 131 

132 — 1 35, 267. Used as first movers of ma 

chinery, 128, 140, 158 
Hydrostatic press, 276 

I 

Idols, 82, 106—108. Eolipilic, 398, 399, 570— 

572 
Impostures, 23, 106—108, 376—378. See 

juggling. 
Imprisoning chairs, 429, 573 
Incas of Peru. Aqueducts erected by them, 

165—168 
Incendiaries, 308, 350. Punishment of, 351 
India ink, 70 

Indians, American, 50, 107, 180 
Inertia, 373, 503 
Intermitting springs, 506 
Inventions, how realized, 359. Few record 

ed, 416. Cause of this, 427. Advantages 

of recording them, 453. Century of, 64, 

140, 362, 428—438 
Inventors, old, concealed their discoveries, 

and why, 427. Caricatured, 439 
Iodine, discovery of, 414 
Iron cauldrons soldered, 20. Iron statues, 

142. Planing iron, 283 
Iron first cast in England, 553 
Irrigation, 2S, 79, 80, 83, 84, 95, US, 119, 

126, 131, 132, 163. Aquarius, an emblem 

of, 119 ' 
Italian mode of raising water to upper floors 

63. Fountains, 534, 537 



Jack, old name of a man-servant, 75. Smoke- 
jack, ibid. 

Jack of Hilton, a Saxon eolipile, 398 

Jacks of the clock, 543 

Jacob's well, 38, 42, 44 

Jaculator fish. 257 

Jautu, S9. Alluded to by Moses, 90 

Japanese water- works, 125, 557. Clocks, 543 

Jehoahaz, portrait of at Thebes, 116 

Jetsd'eau, 163,532—541 

Jeweled holes for pivots of watches, 122, 547 

Jews, their wells, 25, 33, 34. Watering land, 
86. Their arts, 133 

Joseph's well, 38, 45 — 47. Divining cup, 200 

Josephus, quoted, 38, 40, 54 

Juggling, jugglers, magicians, &c. 23, 106 — 
10S, 198— 201, 376— 385, 519, 521—523 

Juvenal, quoted, 19,43, 121, 310, 311, 312, 
377. Banished, 48 

K 

Kircher, on the speaking statue of Memnon, 
377. Bellows-pump from, 243. Turned a 
spit by an eolipile, 396. His mode of 
raising water by steam, 422 

Kitchens, 75. Egyptian, 237, 23S, 517 

Kites, bovs', 422 

Knives of gold and edged with iron, 5. Port 
able knives, 205 

Koran, quoted, 10, 54, 117 



Laban's images, 571 
Ladders, portable, 350, 431 






INDEX. 



605 



Laxes Moeris and Mareotis, 80 

Lamps, 242,243,421 

Lantern bellows, 237—240. Pump, 241, 242 

Lares. See Idols. 

Lateral communication of motion, 475—480 

Laver of brass, 557 

Law, a bar to the progress of the arts, 427 

Lead, pigs of: leaden roofs, coffins, rolled 
lead, pipes, &c. 163, 211, 550—554 

Leaden pipes tinned, 555 

Leather pipes, 304, 326 

Lenses, concave and convex, 380, 381 

Leopold's Fire-engines, 329 — 331. Steam- 
engines, 462, 469 

Level, 26S 

Library, in an ancient ship, 147. Alexandrian, 
destroyed, 415 

Lions' heads on cocks, gutters, &c. 119, 557 

Liquor tasters, 195, 199 

Llama of Peru, 257 

Load-stone for suspending an iron statue, &c, 
142 

Lobster's tail, mechanism of, 258 

Locomotive carriages, 403, 423, 424, 473. 
Increasing draft of chimneys of, 397, 488 

London water-works, 294—296, 321, 434, 567 

Looking-glasses, 121 

Lucan, quoted, 108, 125, 540 

Lustral vase and water, 387 

M 

Macaroni, kneading. 91 

Machines, worked by the feet, 90, 237—239. 
War machines, 305 

Machines of Ctesibius, 122, 192,213,259,266— 
270, 547 

Madagascar, bellows of, 246, 252 

Magic goblets, 518, 520 

Magnet, ancient one, 142 

Mahomedans, traditions and customs of, 12, 
35, 36 

Mahomet, 10, 54. His coffin, 142 

Man, his body a living pump, 257. His past 
and future condition, 388—390, 508 

Manco Capac, 168, 172 

Mangle, Chinese, 90 

Manuscripts, 108 

Mariner's compass, 143 

Marli, water-works at, 296—298 

Mars, represented, 308 

Martial, quoted, 521 

Mastodon, tradition of, 165. No extinct ani- 
mals of the ox kind thirty feet high, 210 

Mathesius, 410 

Mechanic powers, origin of some, 1. Imple- 
ments, 5, 6 

Mechanics, ancient, little known of them, 
3, 4. An account of their works and work- 
shops would have been invaluable, 4. The 
true heroes of old, 4, 5. Formerly seated 
when at work, 139, 240. Advantages of 
studying the mechanism of animals, 258. 
Old priests first-rate mechanics, 104, 401, 
441 

Mechanism, revolving, 282 — 284 

Medea, inventress of warm and vapor baths, 
120 

Medicines, quack, 120 

Memnon, statue of, 377, 401 

Mercurial guage and safety valves, 451 

Metals, hammered into plates, 2, 283, 551. 
Drawn into wire, 2. And into pipes, 554. 
Ancient works in, 6, 87, 162, 171, 557. See 
preface. 

Metallic mirrors, 121 

Mexicans, 34, 159—162 

Mills, 282, 419, 423 



Mines, ventilation of, 488. Raising water 
from. See Agricola, Ramseye,Savery,New 
comen, Worcester. 

Mirrors, 87, 121, 172 

Moclach, a vizier, 55 

Momentum, 883, 366, 367, 373. Animals have 
a knowledge of it, 365 

Monks, their ingenuity and professions, 104 — ■ 
108, 386 

Montgolfier's ram, 369—372 

Moon, Wilkin's project to reach it, 103 

Moreland, Samuel, his pump and speaking- 
trumpet, 273. Steam-engine, 441 — 445 

Morey's motive engine, 473 

Motion, transmitted by air, 448. Rotary, 
282— 2S4 

Motive engines, 423, 472—474 

Mouth, various operations of, 477 

Musical machines, 17, 381. See Eolipiles t 
Memnon. 

Mythology, Egyptian, S2 — 85. Peruvian, 167 

N 
Naamah, the supposed inventress of spinning, 

283 
Nabis, his cruelty, 573 
National vauntings, 402 
Natural pumps and devices for raising liquids, 

209, 210, 256—258, 505—513 
Neptune, 507 
Nero, his golden house, 539. Water-clock, 

549 
Nets, fishing, 86, 87 
New-Amsterdam, wells in, 299. Fires and 

fire-wardens in, 339, 340 
New- York, minutes of common council, 299 

300. Old treasury note, 300. Fire-engines, 

341—345 
Newcomen and Cawley's engine, 296, 464 

—468 
Niagara falls, currents of air at, 476 
Nineveh, well at, 26, 36 
Noria, Chinese, 112. Egyptian, 113. Spanish, 

114. Roman, 113. Syrian 116. Mexican, 

163 
Nuremburg, in the 16th century, 324. Curious 

report of Engineers, 556 



Omar, logic of, 415 

Oracle at Delphi, prediction of, 241 

Organs, 547—550 

Organ-makers, priests, 401 

Oscillation of liquids, 497 

Osiris, 82. Made his own plough, 83, 132 

Ovid, quoted, 11, 13,52, 76, 120 

Oysters, swallowing, 181. Their movements, 
257 

P 

Paddle-wheels, 454. Their antiquity, 406. 
Substitutes for, 291,406 

Palladium of Troy, 12,571 

Panama chains, 162 

Paper, Chinese mill, 90. Made by steam, 
388. Experiments with a sheet of, 4S3. 
Marbling, 323 

Papin, 1. His air-gun, 181. Driven from 
France by religious persecution, 446. His 
digesters, 447. Safety valve) 447,451. Air- 
machine, 447 — 450. Explosive engine, 450. 
Steam machines, 450 — 452 

Parabolic jambs of fire-places, 4S3 

Paris, water- works of, 296-— 29S. Fire-engines, 
327—331,336 

Pascal, his experiments on atmospheric pres« 
sure, 189 

Patents and patentees, old, 439 



606 



INDEX. 



Paving cities, 553 

Pedal for pounding rice, 90, 91 

Pegu, customs in, respecting water, 35 

Pelanque, 164 

Pendulum machine to raise water, 92, 93. 

Pendulum for watches, 441 
'cnelope and Ulysses, 2S3 
/erfumed fountains, 539, 540 
■•erfumes dispersed by eolipiles, 401 

Perpetual motions, 566, 567 

Peruvians, their Asiatic origin doubtful, 172. 
Whistling bottles of, 17. Mirrors, 121, 
172. Wells and irrigation, 165— 167. Com- 
mon utensils of gold, 171. Ancient city 
disinterred, 17. Sucking tubes, 204. Not 
ignorant of the bellows, 253 — 256. Dials, 
542, 547 

Persians, worshiped wells, 36. Ambassadors 
thrown into wells, 27. Raising water, 96, 
573. Fountains, 539, 541 

Persian wheel for raising water, 115 

Peter Martyr, quoted, 106, 314 

Pewter and pewterers, 162, 260 

Philadelphia, water-works of, 300. Fire-en- 
gines, 344 

Phocion, 537, 565 

Piasa, a bird that devoured men, 165 

Picotah, a machine to raise water, 97 

Pins and needles, 87, 121. First made in 
England, 323 

Pipes, water, flexible, 25S. In Mexico, 163. 
In Peru, 170. Asia, 211. Pompeii, 211, 
552. Rome, 213, 552. Of earthenware, 
58. Of leather, 304. Of lead, 552, 553. 
Drawn, 554. Tinned, 555 

Pipkins, 18, 19 

Pistons, 206, 214, 215, 307, 438 

Piston bellows, 244—253 

Piston and cylinder, various applications of, 
358, 359, 425 

Piston steam-engine, of Worcester, 435 — 437. 
Of Hautefille and Huyghens, 441. Of Pa- 
pin, 450. Of Newcomen, 465. Of Leopold, 
469 

Plato, his views of mechanics, 3. His musi- 
cal clocks, 543, 548 

Play-bills, ancient one, 540 

Pliny the elder, quoted, 9, 15, 19, 35, 43, 68, 
79,81,96, 130, 192, 194,203,212,213,265, 
270, 549, 551. His death, 28 

Pliny the younger, his letter to Trajan, 309. 
Account of his gardens, 536 

Plough, 82, 83, 132. Engine for drawing 423 

Plutarch, quoted, 3, 12,81, 118,311,366,537, 
542, 548 

Poison, in wells, 40 

Pompeii, its discovery, 29. .Antiquities found 
in, 29, 30, 43, 55, 211,552 

Porta, Baptist, 1,413. Quoted, 379, 381, 430. 
his Digester, 393. Raised water by heat, 
379. By steam, 407—409. By a siphon , 529 

Potter, a boy, who made the steam-engine 
self-acting, 470 

Pressure engines, 352 — 362. Natural, 506 

Prester, John, fights the Mongals with eoli- 
piles, 400 

Printing, 2, 70, 388 

Printers' devices, 194 

Projectors, ridiculed in a public procession, 
439 

Propelling vessels on water. See Paddle- 
wheels. 

Pulley, its origin, used by the Egyptians, 59. 
Used for raising water, 58 — 63 

Pumps, atmospheric : of uncertain origin, 
212. Mentioned by Pliny, 96, 213. See 
also 21 1—230. Limits to which water rises 



in, 190, 223. These limits known to old 
pump-makers, 191. Deceptions with, 224, 
225. Bag-pump, 209. Bellows, do. 205— 
210. Burr, do. 214. Centrifugal, do. 229, 
230. German, do. 138, 207, 218, 219. Na- 
tural, do. 209, 210. Liquor, do. 215. Spa- 
nish, do. 217, 224 
Pumps, forcing, 262—293. Common pump, 
263. Enema, 263. Bellows, 241, 257,207, 
56S. Double acting, 271. Mercurial, 275. 
Natural, 209, 210, 256—258. Stomach, 264. 
Plunger, 272, 444. Perkins' 281. Rotary, 
284—291, 373. Reciprocating rotary, 292, 

Pumps, lifting, 277—279 
Pusterich, a steam idol, 399 
Pythagoras, 43S 

Q 

Quadrant, the, invented by Godfrey, 143 

Quern, hand-mill, 282 

Quippus, historical cords of the Peruvians, 
168, 172 

R 

Rain at Thebes, a prod igy, 81 

Rams, battering, 366. Siphon ram, 531. Wa- 
ter rams, 366—372. Natural water rams 
506 

Ramseye, his patent for raising water by fire, 
419 

Razors, bronze, 121. Mexican, 162 

Reciprocating rotatory pumps, 292, 293 

Regal, 550 

Religious persecutions, 446 

Remora, sucking fish, 185 

Respiration, 475, 477 

Richard III. his coffin, a watering trough. 49 

Riddles, 437 

Rigny, De, his steam machine, 463 

Rivatz, a Swiss machinist, 462 

Rivaz, his motive engine, 473 

Rivius, eolipiles from, 396 

Rocking machine for raising water, 93 

Rolling press, 323 

Rome, invaded by the Gauls from the report 
of a smith, 19. Houses in, 310 

Roman wells, 28,34,40, 41, 50. Chain of 
pots, 124, Water screw, 138. Fire-engines, 
310, 311. Firemen, 309. Fountains, 533, 
539, 540. Mirrors, 121 

Roode of Grace, an English idol, 106 

Rope pump, 136 

Rotatory movements, 282 — 284 

Rotatory pumps, 2S1— 291. Defects of, 291 

Russia, pumps in, 220 

S 

Safety valves, 3S7, 391, 447, 451 

Sails of ships, 26S 

Saladin, 47, 372 

Salting fish, in Egypt, S6. Its revival in Eu- 
rope, 86 

Sanguisuchello, 203 

Sap, ascent of, 507—509 

Sarbacans. 256 

Sarcophagii, used as watering troughs, 49, 99 

Sauce pans, 21 

Savery, his experiments and engines, 453 — 
460. His bellows, 483 

Saw, 268 

Scipio, his baths, 55S. Dowry of his daugh- 
ter, 121 

Scoop, to raise water, 93. Scoop wheel, 111 

Scots, worshiped wells, 37 

Screws for raising water, 137 — 142, 566 

Scythian tradition, 12 



INDEX. 



607 



Seneca, quoted, 26, 310, S94, 558 
Serviere, his inventions, 63, 91, 2S5, 429 
Shadoof, Egyptian, 94, 95 
Shakespeare, quoted, or illustrated, 195, 350 

401,534,535 
Sheet-lead and other metals, 551 
Ships, steam, of Garay, 403. Of Ramseye, 

419. Ventilation of, 488 
Ship-building-, ancient, 146, 147. Chinese, 158 
Ship pumps, 143, 147, 154—157, 214—217,227. 

567 
Shoes, ancient, 50. Motezuma's, 161 
Shrine of Becket, 106 
Siamese water-clocks, 544 
Sieve, Tutia carrying water in one, 198. The 

trick explained, ibid. 
Silk, watering of, 323 

Silver pipes, cocks and cisterns, 170, 557, 560 
Siphons, 192, 193, 212, 268, 514—532. Ca- 
pillary, 513. Natural, 506. Ram, 531. Act 

in vacuo, 515. Other devices so named, 

212,213, 304, 307,311, 315 
Smoke jacks, 75 
Smoking tobacco, 270, 454, 477 
Soap-making, raising ley by steam, 413, 414. 

Great sums expended on soap, ibid. Soap 

factory in Pompeii, ibid. 
Socrates, 537 
Soldering, 551. Cast iron, 20. Phenomenon 

attending, 512 
Solomon, cisterns of, 48 
Souffleur, 504 

Spaniards, their conquest of America, 159 
Spanish pump-maker, anecdote of, 224. Spa- 
nish steam-ship, 403—406. Chain of pots, 

126. Bells, 314 
Speaking tubes, 106, 107. Trumpets, 273, 

34S. Heads, 106, 108, 377 
Spectacles, 70 
Speculums, 121 
Sphinx, 119, 437 
Spindle, spinning, &C.2S3, 284 
Spiral pump, 363 
Spiritalia, a work writteD by Heron, 270, 306, 

312, 376, 3S6, 415, 518—520 
Spouting tubes, 497 — 504 
Sprinkling vessels, atmospheric, 194—196,567 
Spurting snake, 257 
Statues, 43. Iron one of Arsinoe, 142. Of 

Memnon, 377, 401. Leaden, 535, 550 
Steam, its effects, 359, 388—391. Its me- 

chanical properties, 391, 392, 407. 409. 

Supposed identity with air, 395 — 400, 41S 

42i 572 

Steam-boats, 403, 419, 423, 424, 438 

Steam-boilers of coiled tubes, 394. Of wood 
and granite, 470 

Steam-engines, 2S4, 359, 425. Heron's, 394. 
Garay's, 404. Branca's, 418. Classification 
of, 425. Worcester's, 437. Moreland's, 
442—444. Papin's, 450—452. Savery's, 
455 — 460. Other engines, 462 — 464. New- 
comen's, 465. Leopold's, 469. Made self- 
acting by a boy, 251, 470 

Steam-guns, 395, 573 

Steam-idols, 395, 398, 399, 570—572 

Steam-machinists, courtiers, 445 

Stings of bees, 257 

Stomach pump, 264 

Stoves, Chinese, 70. Fire-places, 483 

Strabo's account of Memnon, 377 

Stuvvesant, Peter, proclamations bv him, 
339, 340 

Suckers, boys', 181. Natural, 1S2, 183, 184,185 

Sucking tubes, 203, 204. Sucking wounds, 202 

Suction, 201,202 

Sugar boiling in vacuo, 495 



Sulphur baths, ancient, 120 

Sun, raising water by the heat of, 378 — 3S0 
Distilling by, 381. Raising steam by, 470 

Surgical instruments, found at Pompeii, 282 

Swape, 94—103 

Syene, well at, 48 

Syracuse, dial at, 542. The name of Archi- 
medes' ship, 146 

Syringe, 259 — 261. An emblematic device, 
261. Used as fire-engines, 312, 315—317 



Tacitus, quoted, 214 

Tanks, water, S3 

Tantalus, city of, 98. Cups, 520 

Tartar necromancy, 522 

Tenures, 39S 

Teraphim, 571. 572 

Tezcuco, 161. Supplied with water, 163 

Theatres, fountains in, recommended, 540 

Thebes, a wonder at, 81 

Themistocles, 43 

Theodorus, of Samos, 5 

Thirst, modes of quenching, 11. Sufferings 
from, 31, 32 

Tinkers, Chinese, 20, 24S 

Tlascala, 159. Its water-works, 160 

Tobacco smoking, 270, 454, 477. Engine fo< 
cutting, 323 . 

Toledo, old water-works at, 294 

Toltecs, 160 

Tools, 5, 87, 132, 172,268 

Toothed wheels, 71. 72, 114, 121 

Tornados, 482 

Torricelli, 187, 1S8 

Tourne-broche, 75, 76, 565. Eolipilic, 396. 
39S, 429 

Towers, war, 304 

Toys, 87, 26S 

Traditions of the Mahomedans and Scy- 
thians, 12. Arabs, 95. Peruvians, 167 

Trajan, his directions respecting fires, 309 

Traps for drains, 562, 563 

Tread-wheels, 73, 74, 76, 116, 117, 152 

Treasury note, copy of an old one, 300 

Trees of Australia, 509. Of siiver, brass, &c. 
538 

Trevithick's pump, 280 

Tricks. See Juggling. 

Triton, musical, of silver, 534 

Trombe, or shower bellows, 476 

Troy, fountains at, 49 

Trumpets, speaking, 273, 342. Ear, 379, 573 

Tubal Cain, his bellows, 232. See Vulcan. 

Turkish fountains, 31. Fire-engines, 316 

Tutia, carrying water in a sieve, 198, 3S6 

Tympanum for raising water, 110, 114 

Tyre, a well at, 38. Glass mirrors made at, 
121 

U 

Union joints, 326,459 



Vacuum, B. Porta on, 379. Produced by 

steam, 407, 4S9. In open tubes, 4S2— 496 

Boiling sugar in, 495 
Valentinian, anecdote of, 196 
Valves, 232, 235, 26S, 307, 555, 556. Safety, 

3S7, 391,447,451 
Vapor engines, 441 , 472, 473 
Vases, ancient, 16, 17. For lustral water, 387 
Vauxhall, engines at, 434. Gardens, 445 
Vegetius, old translation of. 177, 207, 2)" 

430, 522 
Veneering, S7 

Ventilation of mines, ships, &c. 488 
Venturi, experiments by, 47S— 480 



608 



INDEX. 



Vestals, 195—197, 383 

Virgil, quoted, 3, 11, 12, 13, 34, 117, 238, 302 

Vision of Mahomet, 98 

Vitruvius, quoted, 9, 34, 109, 113,117,124, 

139, 192, 244, 266, 269, 392, 395 
Vulcan, bellows of, 232, 239, 240. Trip ham- 

niers, 568. Imprisoning chair, 573 

W 

Wagons, steam, 423, 424 

Walrus, climbs by atmospheric pressure, 183 

Wars, warriors, 3, 308, 359. See preface. 

Watches and clocks, 71, 122, 323, 350, 441, 
542—547 

Watch chains, 323 

Water, its importance in nature and the arts, 
9, 302, 358. Supposed identity with air, 
395,418,420,421,572. Worshiped, 33— 
37, 565. Penalty for stealing, 43. Fresh 
dipped from the sea, 519 

Water beds, 178. Bombs, 349. Canes, 372. 
Carriers, S3, 84. Closets, 561. Hammer, 
367. Lute, 451. Power, 480. Rams, 368 
—371. Spouts, 477, 510. Wheels, 125,282, 
56S 

Water- works .at Hamath, 116. In Japan, 
125. At Babylon, 133— 135. Of the Peru- 
vians. 165—172. Mexicans, 160—162. At 
Augsburgh, Bremen, Toledo, Paris, and 
London, 294, 295, 296. Old ones described, 
438. In America. 298. Roman, 267, 480 

Watt, 145, 258. See preface. 

Waves, 366, 367 

Wedge, 268 

Weather-glasses, 375 

Weeping images, 108 

Wells, 24—49, 52, 71 , 241 , 565. Solon's laws 
respecting, 27. Reflections on, 48. Venti- 
lation of, 488. Worshiped, 33—37, 565. 
Ancie.it American wells, 50, 160—167. 
Their examination desirable, 50 

Wheels, flash, 94. Other wheels to raise 
water 109—116. Wheel of fortune, 118. 
Scoop 111. Persian, 115. Capstan 77. 



Wheels, tread, 73—76, 116, 117, 152. Cog. 
71, 72," 114, 121 

Whistles, in Peruvian bottles, 17. Chaldean 
cups, 201 

Whitney, Eli, 359 

Whitehurst's water ram, 368 

Wilkins, Bishop, quoted, 103, 104,390,418, 
429—431,566 

Windlass, 6S— 72, 573 

Wind-mills, 125, 139, 151, 158, 418, 572 

Wines, concentration of, 440. Mixed, 517. 
Siphons for tasting, 195, 516, 522 

Wine flask, Savery's experiment with, 454 — 
455 

Winifred's well, miracle at, 37 

Winnowing machine, 70 

Wire, ancient, 2, 87, 121, 162, 323. Mill for 
drawing, 423 

Wirtz's spiral pump, 363 

Woden's well, 35 

Woisard's air machine, 473 

Women, early experimenters on steam, 391 

Wooden hams, 70 

Worcester, Marquis of, his century of inven- 
tions, 64, 140, 362, 428—440, 539. His 
steam-boat, 438. Steam-engine, 437. His 
character and death, 439 

World, the, an hydraulic machine, 505 

Wynken de Worde, quoted, 314 

X 

Xerxes, his chair, 4; Sends a distaff to his 
general, 283 



Yoke, 83, 117. Description of an Egyptian 

one, 84 
Yucatan, ancient wells in, 164, 165 



Zem Zem, the holy well of Mecca, 35, 43 

44,45 
Zeno, his quarrel with Anthemius, 393 
Zodiac, signs of S5 



